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MY GARDEN WALK. 



WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSTON. 
It 



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Copyright, 1894, 
By WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSTON. 






MY GARDEN WALK. 



" Quicquid agunt homines, votum, timor, ira, voluptas, 
Gaudia, discursus, nostri farrago libelli." 

Juvenal Satira i, 

" Whate'er men do, their vows, fear, wrath, delight. 
Their joys, vagaries, such the stuff I write." 



PROEM. 



I. BUDS. 

II. BLOSSOMS. RATHE PRIMROSES. 

III. WILDWOOD FLOWERS. 

IV. THE ROSE. 

V. MARGUERITES. 

VI. LAUREL AND MYRTLE. 

VII. BRAMBLES AND BERRIES. 

VIII. VIOLETS, PANSIES AND ASPHODELS. 



— 3 — 



THIS VOLUME 

I s 

DEDICATED 

TO 

MY DAUGHTERS 



I would my hand had skill, my voice had tune, 
To tell in numbers how my full heart beats 
With tender love, and still the theme repeats, 
When thinking on kind Nature's kindest boon, 
Sent to me e'er my manhood's royal noon, 
The gift of children, in whose being meets 
All that paternal pride forecasts with sweets 
Born of a mother's love, withdrawn too soon. 



Fair buds that from the Queen-Rose stem have sprung 
— O flower of Eden beyond all earthly price, 
You leave us naught save memory's fragrance faint — 
Their gentle heads in sorrow long have hung, 
Catching love's perfume sweet from paradise, 
Immortal message of a vanished saint. 



•4 — 



I 

BUDS. 

Buds. Motto. 

Youth's Echoes. 

Plantation Home. 

Elysium. 

Faerie Land. 

The Broken Bough. 

Anacreon to his Lyre. Translation. 

The Street. 

The Texas Mother's Lament. 



II 

BLOSSOMS. RATHE PRIMROSES. 

Blossoms. A prelude. 

Florence. 

The Coquette. 

La Gitana. 

Cleopatra. 

The Marble Heart. 

Mildred. 



— 5 



Ill 

WILDWOOD FLOWERS. 



Motto. 

Death of Daniel Boone. 

The Bloodwet Glove. 

The Witch. 

The Cavalier's Sword. 

The Soldier's Widow. 

Mary Stuart's Farewell. 

Song of Olaf. 

To Pyrrha. (Horace. Book I. Ode 5). 



The Argo. 



IV 
THE ROSE. 

MELODIES AND THRENODIES. 

The Rose. A prelude. 

Once for all. 

Love's Morning Star. 

Christmas Courting. 

Sympathy. 

Transmutation. 

The Consoler. 

Steadfast. 

The Young Huntsman. 

Queens of the Past. 

Divinest of Women. 



V 

MARGUERITES. 

My Lady's Name. 
Life's Puzzle. 
The Queen. 
Hymettus HilL 
Vetiver. 

Sweet Marguerite. 
Little Lady. 
My Lady. 



VI 

LAUREL AND MYRTLE. 

Fletcher of Saltoun. A prelude. 

The Torch of Liberty. 

John Mitchell. 

The Farmer's Grange. 

The Strike Ended. 

Mam'selle Guillotine. 

Summer Musings. 

Defeat. 

The Gettysburg Dead. 

The Golden Age. 

Patrick Henry. 

The Patriot South. 



VII 

BRAMBLE AND BERRY. 

The Master. 

The Return of Youth. 

The French Market. 

The Skylark. 

Evolution and Creation. 

The Epitaph. 

The Sealed Book. 

To Gertrude. 

A Benediction. 

The Live Oak. 



VIII 

VIOLETS, PANSIES AND ASPHODELS. 

Reflection. 

The Legend of Jubal. 

Whited Sepulchres. 

The Wasp. 

The Butterfly. 

Cui Bono. 

Carpe Diem. 

Rest. 

Lethe. 

Lotus Land. 

Kosmos— Dream of the Time Spirit. 

The Thane's Saying. 

Welcome, Dear Grief. 

Prayer Answered. 

Rejoice. 

The Fear of Death. 

Euthanasia. 

— 8 — 



PROEM. 



A poem should be a rare and perfect work — 

Each word a gem set in the graven gold — 

Beneath whose symbols subtle meanings lurk, 

So that the soul and sense may each behold 

The image mirrored there it knows its own. 

A poem is not an airy bubble blown 

By childish lips in merriment or play; 

Though but a story, still it must be told 

In strains to live beyond a summer day, 

If to the epic height 'twould rise and swell. 

And bloom perennial as the asphodel : 

Or should the singer dare the lyre essay, 

His skillful hand must strike with plectrum bold 

His own tense heartstrings, till they throb and thrill 

With ode and paan that picture forth the soul 

In forms of thought and surging sounds that roll 

And the vast concave with their echoes fill. 

If I come piping then on minor key. 
Think not I hope to match with spirits high, 
Born for large fame and immortality, 
Whom willingly the world will not let die ; 
But as, at peep of dawn some tiny bird 
With twitter small among the leaves is heard, 



Till his weak note wakes all the grove to song 
And the full flock with tuneful voice reply, 
In the fair woodlands making echo long 
Their psalmody, with praise to God and joy; 
And last, as up to Zeus the immortal boy, 
Young Ganymede, on eagle pinion strong, 
His flagon bore, the lark shall soar on high 
With meed of music, so my lays shall fire 
Our Southland bards their minstrelsy to sing, 
And stir some spirit, on Olympian wing, 
Boldly to rise and lead the warbling choir. 



But, ah, in vain ! My voice comes all too late, 
Since Wilde, whose "life was like the summer's rose," 
Has sweetly sung, and that harsh stepdame. Fate, 
Has made a wreck of melancholy Poe's 
Seraphic harp and jangled his sweet Bells: 
Sad singer, what a dirge to hope there knells, 
When black winged doubt with thy sad Raven broods, 
And in thy Haunted Palace madness glows. 
While music hails thee master of her moods ! 
But soft, a murmurous melody I hear; 
Through all the chords it rings ; it is Lanier ! 
Ah, gentle spirit, in the solitudes 
Of soul a fount of living waters flows ; 
And there thou'st woven into a cestus rare. 
With words, a skein of harmony divine, 
And girdled Nature, with a song so fine, 
It lends its voiceful charms to earth and air. 



— lo. 



Nor can my heart its wild, quick throb forget, 

When first it heard ring out "My Maryland," 

That war song bold which haunts the memory yet, 

And marches through the years with foot fall grand. 

Why art thou silent, Randall ? Did the pall 

That draped the Virgin slain, on thee too fall? 

Or shall we hear thy herald trumpet sound 

Her coming, once again on earth to stand. 

The Immortal One, now risen from depths profound, 

Her old robes cast, and changed in form and name, 

But still in hate of tyranny the same? 

As thou the herald of the Goddess crowned, 

When waved aloft her flashing warlike brand, 

So Ryan, Poet Priest, compels the tear 

That for his country fills reluctant eyes, 

Then drops where prone the silent minstrel lies, 

Draped with the Conquered Banner by her bier. 

But, as I name them, on my memory throng 
All the sweet choir that mingle in the strain 
The bay crowned bards who to the band belong, 
Led by the mystical and sad eyed Hayne. 
Among them who, with tenderer, truer touch, 
Unlocks the heart than she who loveth much, 
The gracious lady, who in Lexington 
With healing words hath shed a balm for pain, 
And sympathy for martyred virtue won ? 
I may not name them : many the honored shade 
Whose accents live, though in the dust be laid 
Their cerements of clay — their world work done; 

— 11 — 



Yet still they haunt the heart, that sacred fane 
Where poesy lingers and its soft glow sheds: 
Be mine the task to wreath their laureled heads, 
And fire new Sauls to join the prophetic train. 



-12- 



I 

BUDS 



Scorn not this posy, withered now and sere, 
Not culled from flowers, but buds unformed and crude ; 
It brings back memories of the opening year, 
When first the muse with trembling voice I wooed. 

1848— 1852. 



— 13 — 



YOUTH'S ECHOES. 



O what I brought when I was young, 
As love's large tribute, was a tongue 
That all the sounds of Nature sung, 
That echoed the continuous surge 
Of mighty waters when they urge 
Their leap beyond the torrent's verge; 
Echoes I call them, for no word 
Can tell the melody I heard 
In breeze and stream and song of bird ; 
In all the sounds and all the sights, 
In which boon Nature so delights, 
Disporting on her airy heights — 
Yet echoes from the soul of man. 



— 14 — 



THE PLANTATION HOME, 



I know a fair plantation home, set in the far south- 
west, 

In a land of rarer beauty than Araby the Blest. 

A rude and iogbuilt cottage, half hid amid the trees. 

Which sigh and kiss with perfumed lips the seaborn 
evening breeze, 

Peeps from the tangled forest, where it meets the 
prairie wide 

And the live oak and the mesquite grow kindly side 
by side. 

There golden waves of wild rye roll with a shim- 
mering sheen, 

And cotton blooms make gay the fields that fringe 
the woodland green. 

In whose dim aisles swing sadly the trailing moss 
o'erhead, 

Shrouding the green in funeral grey like banners of 
the dead. 

There timidly the startled doe shrinks from the hun- 
ter's eye. 

And teaches at her warning the spotted fawn to fly. 

And the heron stands the livelong day beside the 
sedgy marsh, 

— 15 — 



While high in heaven the wild-goose wedge with 

answering call cronks harsh. 
There man comes not with troubling foot to break 

the long day dream, 
And nature reigns in solitude, serene, sad and supreme, 
O'er a land forever beautiful, a sky forever clear ; 
Ah, may that land be happy to those that are so dear. 



lb- 



ELYSIUM. 



What is Elysium, Child of dreams? 

A land that with strange beauty teems ; 

An island in the silvery seas, 

Where the low murmur of the breeze, 

With a half-human sighing sings 

The mingled charms that Hesperus flings 

On sea, and sky and rocky shore. 

When leaps the surf and breakers roar; 

Where zephyrs breathe with plaintive moan, 

Soft as a lover's parting tone; 

Where rippling streamlets weave a measure, 

That laps the soul in languid pleasure. 

And music's varying strains combine 

To thrill the soul with joy divine ; 

Where fruits and flowers that charm the eye 

Scattered in rich profusion lie— 

The purpling grape on vagrant vines 

Whose blood in crystal goblets shines. 

Rose and lily and bloom of gold 

And flambent cups that honey hold 

Pendulous swing, or gem the green 

With jewels fit to crown a queen ; 

Where mermaids comb their yellow hair. 

And sound their shells to a mournful air, 

-17 — 



Or sing the story of one who grieved 
Because she loved and was deceived, 
But, trusting still and loving on, 
Her wandering lover to her won ; 
Where fragrant mists that lightly hover 
Lift silver veils and scenes discover 
That breathe of a diviner seeming 
Than ever crossed a mortal's dreaming ; 
Where joys of sense and spirit throng — 
There is Elysium, realm of song! 



18^ 



FAERIE LAND. 



Is it the faerie land I see 
Down in the depths of the water dim, 
Where falls the shadow of leaf and tree, 
And water-nymphs chant their evening hymn ; 
Or, is that foliage, dusky and brown. 
Wreathing in many a garlanded crown, 
The substance, whose mocking shadows frown 
From the depths of the water dim? 

Is it the beautiful faerie land, 
With castle and tower and stately hall. 
That I darkly trace on the wave- washed sand 
When the sombre curtains of twilight fall ; 
Or is it the image of yon high shore, 
Trending away to a blasted moor, 
With ghostlier outline than ever before 
Was traced on the wave-washed sand? 

Is it a voice from Elf land drear 
That tauntingly whispers of love forgot. 
Or the murmuring breeze I faintly hear. 
And the waters that glide by this lone spot; 
Or is it the distant evening bell. 
Whose cadences slowly sink and- swell. 
Which calls to prayer by its solemn knell, 
And soothingly whispers of love forgot. 

— 19 — 



THE BROKEN BOUGH. 



To a lily in a dream, 
Stooping by a sullen stream, 
Vestal holy, bending lowly 
By a slow and sullen stream, 
Spake an oak-branch sere and riven. 
By the slothful currents driven 
Midst the sedges on the edges 
Of the slow and sullen stream, 
Where 'twas drifted by the surges 
Sighing melancholy dirges. 

"I'm a hapless thing, and gloom 
Brooding o'er me is my doom ; 
A blighted bough thou seest me now. 
With a hapless, hopeless doom. 
Riven by the lightning's stroke 
From a gnarled and ancient oak, 
At whose branches Heaven launches 
All its lurid bolts of flame- 
Thus, alas! thou seest me now 
But a sere and withered bough." 

"Lily, love me! Lily, love me! 
By the blue arch bright above thee ; 

— 20 — 



I am lonely, I'm one only 

In the wide world all alone ; 

Though I be a rugged stranger 

Marred and searred with life and danger, 

Sighing ever, happy never, 

In the wide world all alone ; 

I am sinking here before thee ; 

I adore thee, — I adore thee." 

And the lilly by the stream 
Had no more a quiet dream, 
Dropping gently, innocently, 
By the slow and sullen stream ; 
Yet she gave no outward token, 
But in accents soft and broken, 
Murmured slowly, murmured lowly, 
"Ah ! believe me, 'tis a dream ; 
And she bent all broken-hearted, 
As the blighted bough departed. 

Far away the bough is wending; 
Yet behold the lily bending. 
No reprieving to her grieving 
By the slow and sullen stream ; 
And no more of peace is given 
To the oak-branch reft and riven, 
Drifting sadly, never gladly, 
Down the slow and sullen stream ; 
For he hears the breezes sighing 
That the loved and lost is dying. 

— 21 — 



TRANSLATION. 

ANACREON TO HIS LYRE. 



My Lyre! I fain would celebrate 
The sons of Atreus and the fate 
Of Cadmus, but it is in vain 
For me to try so high a strain ; 
Thy chords against the theme rebel, 
And only in Love's praises swell. 
I would Alcides' feats essay, 
If I could make thy strings obey; 
But Love's soft music ever springs 
Spontaneous from thy wilful strings. 
Ye Heroes, then, henceforth farewell ! 
Your deeds I may not hope to tell ; 
For amorous numbers still will glow, 
And from my Lyre unbidden flow. 



— 22 — 



THE STREET. 

A FRAGMENT. 



Up from the thronged street, 

Where the crowded crossings meet, 

Voluminously come 

The busy hum, 

The steady beat 

Of a thousand restless feet, 

Which in piteous cadence falling 

Seem forever to repeat, 

With a solemn sense of sorrow, 

Some tale of woe appalling 

That may happen on the morrow, 

Or may be but the recalling 

Of a wrong the heart once galling. 

Which now stirs forgotten grief 

From the slumber of relief. 

No human spirit knows 

What turbid tide there goes 

In surges through the way. 

By night and day; 

The stream that flows 

In a billowy flood of woes, 

Which in prayers have kept appealing, 

— 23 — 



Or have writhed in silent throes, 
Fearing, scorning aught to utter, 
But now and then revealing 
Thoughts, like bats that flit and flutter, 
In the murky twilight wheeling. 
Which, in many a bitter feeling. 
By the young, the strong, the gifted, 
Are in sighs alone uplifted. 



■24 — 



THE TEXAS MOTHER'S LAMENT/ 



Could not insatiate hands seek other blood 

Than thine, my beautiful, my baby boy? 

How still thou sleepest, my brave hero child! 

So cold and still— thy hazel eye bedimmed, 

And thy young, chubby cheek, that shamed the rose 

For bloom, all paled, all paled and wan in death— 

Thou droopest like a wilted prairie flower. 

For me thou'st died— for me, thy mother, boy; 

For me who would have given a thousand lives 

To save thee, and yet weakly failed to shield 

With this torn bosom, that seemed broad and strong 

To guard from fatal harm the fatherless. 

They came, the pitiless, with painted face 

And visage darkly stained for war and death : 

They trod the trail of blood : I saw their eyes 

Fierce gleaming, and their grim and bodeful looks, 

Their braided scalp locks, and remorseless knives, 

And O, the rifle that hath laid thee low ! 

Where was my boy, when I most womanly 

And weak did fly— he who an hour ago 

In mirthfulness did mock the babbling brook 

And tiptoe chased the flaunting butterfly? 

*See Note A, end of book, 

— 25 — 



He was where his father would have been, 
Guarding my trembling form. 

I weep no more. 
No more I sing his lullaby of love, 
The song of sleep with which I cradled him 
Upon my breast. 1 sing his death song now; 
His hymn of victory over many men. 
The rattlesnake hath struck my dappled fawn ; 
The glittering eye, which in its gaze bears death. 
Hath fallen on him and stolen his life away. 
Foul carrion birds have borne my falcon down. 
While, yet unfledged, he plumed a callow wing. 
Many the sorrows that on woman fall, 
To blight her weary heart, but none like this. 
The path of light, that, to my girlish eyes. 
Seemed fair and fresh with fragrant blossoming 
Is but a way of woe that leads straight down 
Unto the tomb, and every little space 
Is marked by deaths, like milestones by the road. 

Thou hast not perished unavenged, my son ! 
Thy practiced eye and steady hand sent home 
Their death-shots to the cruel breasts of three. 
Despite their crouching forms, their savage wiles, 
And all the guile of Indian stratagem. 
Long madest thou brave defence of hearth and home, 
When lo ! they fled dismayed before thine arm,— 
Goliaths before my David's little arm. 
A fierce, exultant cry broke from thy lips 

— 26 — 



And followed mocking on their flying heels ; 
Thy form dialated and thine eye flashed fire, 
As if inspired by prophet lore thou read'st 
Tablets of gold, by mortal eyes unseen, 
Set up beyond the limits of the grave. 
Thou saw'st thy father on the distant shore ; 
Thou knew'st thy father by his lordly mien, 
And by his warlike port, and by the smile 
Wherewith he greeted thee, and by the wounds 
Which bled in front, and by his red right hand : 
'Twas then they slew thee— slew thee as they fled. 

He sank with limbs relaxed. The chance of war 
Hath wrought more ill than force and cunning arts. 
" Mother," his young lips murmured, and his eyes 
Strove through the gathering darkness to discern 
The face he loved so well ; and his young hands 
Clung to my neck, and, feebly wandering. 
Sought for the curls his pretty lips had kissed 
In sportive babyhood, when on my knee. 
" Mother," he whispered ; "Mother ; "—and was dead. 

My child I do not mourn ; I sing thy death 
As Spartan mothers wailed above their dead. 
They who have slain thee iron bosoms bear ; 
But I am ice, am adamant, to them. 
Thou hast died nobly, and I do not grieve, 
Son of a warrior, worthy of thy sire 
Who reared a pyramid of deathless fame 
On the red ruins of the Alamo ! 



27- 



I do not grieve, I sing triumphantly. 

The mother of a lion-hearted child, 

I too, who bore thee, feel the flame-touched blood. 

Which was in thee, and is of me, and scorns 

The grief of mothers weeping silently. 

I am a cubless dam ; mine eyes are dry, 

For such a loss brings death and blasts the heart. 

I said I would not mourn thee, but said not 

That I no more would touch that pale, broad brow 

That frowns defiance to thy murderers. 

Nor press that pouting lip till now untaught 

To breathe of aught save love and hope and joy, 

Stamped with the sacred seal of martyrdom. 

Cease, faltering voice! thy task is almost done; 

Close, aching eyes in tearless misery! 

Take, take my boy ! this last, this cold, cold kiss ; 

Then break, my heart! in speechless agony. 



1854. 



— 28- 



II 

BLOSSOMS. 

RATHE PRIMROSES. 



"Pale primroses, 
That die unmarried ere they can behold 
Bright Phoebus in his strength." 

— Shakespeare. 
1848—1853. 



— 29 — 



BLOSSOMS 

A PRELUDE. 



These be the blossoms in the green 

That gaily decked life's vernal scene 

With herb and flower and leaf and spray, 

When frolic Cupid had his play, 

Weaving with wine and dance and song 

A merry music all day long. 

E'en as the bees, which hum and swarm 

When blooming May comes biythe and warm. 

Make music, but of honey naught, 

So I, alas, flush and untaught, 

Must needs make melody and sing 

And nestle under Cupid's wing, 

Who left to mock my mimic woe 

These flower tipped darts, this broken bow. 

But when I met the Love-God true. 

Not Dionysus, with his crew 

And rabble rout and Msenad throng. 

Swept more tempestuously along 

And set men's wits and hearts aflame. 

When he to Hellas conquorer came. 

Than Aphrodite's royal son, 

Elate with countless victories won. 

I answered to his joyous call, 

— 30 — 



And made myself his willing thrall, 
To bear his cup, his bow, his shield, 
To string his lyre, or take the field. 
And still obedient to the breath 
Of his behest, to welcome death. 



3J 



FLORENCE. 



In England's rose-embowered vales, 
Each gentle-featured cottage maiden, 
If we believe the minstrel's tales, 
Outvies the wondrous charms of Aidenn ; 
But oh ! the eyes of heavenly blue. 
The clustering curls of auburn tresses, 
Must yield to those of richer hue ; 
Who sees fair Florence, thus confesses. 

On Scotia's hills there dwells a race. 
Whose daughters o'er the highland heather 
Follow the red- deer in the chase. 
With bonnet blue and heron-feather; 
But ah ! their flaxen locks, their air, 
Their agile limbs and ruddy faces. 
Cannot in loveliness compare 
With Florence in her gentler graces. 

The soft and dreamy maid of Spain, 
Her olive cheek suffused with blushes. 
With magic music's tenderest strain 
Her lover's jealous chiding hushes ; 
But olive cheek and light guitar 
And dulcet notes from lips vermilion, 
Must pale before Kentucky's star— 
Thou art not Florence, fair Castilian. 

— 32 — 



THE COQUETTE. 



The elf that frolics in thy smile 

A joyless cynic might beguile; 

The pouting cherub on thy lip 

Would tempt an anchorite to sip ; 

The pensive angel in thine eye 

Could make me weep — I scarce know why, 

Thou'rt like the magic mocking bird 
Whose fitful song at eve is heard, 
As, flitting mid the bloomy bowers, 
White with rose and jasmine flowers, 
He weaves like thee the web of sound 
Whose vocal meshes fold us round. 

Thou'rt like a timid, playful fawn. 
Serene as twilight, blithe as dawn. 
With bounding step and winsome face. 
And movement of such perfect grace 
That, as I gaze, thy sweet control 
Bends to its will my vanquished soul. 



LA GHANA. 



As the tall lily, bending before the light breeze, 
Lends her lips to his kisses with playful devotion, 
Or the Niobe-willow, the saddest of trees. 
Waves its silver-lined foliage with tremulous motion, 
So sways La Gitana, Gitana, Gitana, 
So waves La Gitana her light tambourine. 

As bright cloudlets at sunset, all purple and gold, 
Slowly soar in the amethyst liquid and tender. 
Or the butterfly, flitting o'er woodland and wold, 
Stoops to kiss for a moment the dahlia's proud 
splendor. 
So glides La Gitana, Gitana, Gitana, 
So bends La Gitana with light tambourine. 

As the mystic cicala repeats his shrill notes. 
Or the mocking bird woos, his serenade singing. 
Or the lark, who at dawn in the midheaven floats, 
O'er meadow and upland sends his clear carols 
ringing. 
So trills La Gitana, Gitana, Gitana, 
So sings La Gitana, with light tambourine. 



CLEOPATRA. 



Antony melted pearls in wine, 

To make his love a drink divine, — 

Would that such costly gifts were mine, 

Cleopatra { 

Thy gilded galley proudly glides. 
Its silken awnings flap the sides, — 
My heart's the barge where Eros rides, 

Cleopatra ! 

At thy small feet he laid the East, 
He made thy life a bridal feast; — 
Would that my life gave joy the least, 

Cleopatra ! 

Conqueror of Kings ! for thy sweet sway 
Empire and life he cast away; — 
They were meet guerdon for one day, 

Cleopatra! 

O for one glance of thy bright eyes! 
O for thy beauty's peerless prize ! 
What matter, if thy lover dies! 

Cleopatra! 



— 35 — 



THE MARBLE HEART. 



The poets tell how an ideal beauty 
Pygmalion forced the marble to disclose, 
And wrought, with hand true to artistic duty, 
A shape that fired him in its cold repose. 

The sculptor loved his work, and Aphrodite 
Filled with flush life that fairest form of art; 
And so, poets say, her foster child took pity 
And gave the sculptor, in return, a heart. 

Thus fancy bows to what it hath created, 
—Though the old story is not rightly told— 
The poet sees a form angelic, mated 
With heart of marble, all alive, yet cold; 

A beauteous maid, whose face divine profusion 
Hath dowered with all the Cypriot Queen bestows, 
Till naught is v/anting, save the one illusion 
That in her bosom beats a heart that glows. 



— 36 — 



MILDRED, 



Where Mildred moves, come cloudless skies 
And airs with perfume filled, 
Or, if a cloud perchance should rise. 
Her glance its gloom will gild. 

She goes, and bleaker blows the wind, 
The flowers less sweetly spring. 
The vine with sadder leaf is twined, 
The birds less gaily sing. 

The river glides by marge and isle. 
The cliffs look beetling down ; 
On yesterday they seemed to smile. 
And now they wear a frown. 

By tender retrospect upborne. 
Parting should have no pain ; 
But still our yearning hearts will mourn 
Till Mildred come again. 



37- 



Ill 

WILDWOOD FLOWERS. 

BALLADS. 



When shaws beene sheene and shraddes full fayre, 

And leaves both large and longe, 

It is merry walking in the fayre forest, 

To hear the small bird's songe." 

Old Ballad. 



38- 



THE DEATH OF DANIEL BOONE. 



[ It is said that Boone went out to watch for deer at a 
salt lick, and there died alone. I believed this when this 
ballad was written, but I fear it is a myth.] 



Sadly uprose the yellow sun 

Upon an autumn morn, 
And sadly fell his amber rays 

Aslant the ripened corn — 
Aslant the ripened maize that stood 

Ungathered on the plain, 
Whose plumed tassels proudly waved 

Above the heavy grain. 



The woods were dyed with gorgeous hues ; 

The maples flaunted red, 
Like the broad banner of a king 

When at his army's head; 
Long flights of waterfowl were seen 

Along the prairie's edge, 
Which, circling round in narrowing sweeps, 

Sank down among the sedge. 



Beside a dark and silent tarn, 

A salt tarn wild and gray, 
Beneath a gnarled sycamore 

An aged hunter lay; 
The red deer, bursting through the brake. 

Unnoticed came and drank, 
And all unheeded the black bear 

Stalked through the rushes rank. 



Upon his white head was the frost. 

And on his beard the rime; 
His mighty limbs, so stalwart once, 

Were shrunken now by time ; 
His form was bent and gaunt and grim, 

And cold his gray eye's gleam. 
For shadowy memories came and fled 

Like spirits in a dream. 



Full many a year ago he crossed 

The Alleghany's crest, 
The first lone pioneer that trod 

The valley of the West— 
That vale of matchless loveliness, 

With warfare circled round. 
Which even then the Indian named 

"The dark and bloody ground." 



The red man's foray rose again 

Before his fading sight, 
And many a half-forgotten deed 

That marked some border fight; 
The elk and bison seemed to troop 

Athwart his dying gaze, 
As when of yore they frightened fled 

Before his rifle's blaze. 



Again his heavy bonds he bore 

And marched with pinioned hands, 
With tranquil brow and steady step, 

Among the Indian bands ; 
And like a storm once more he rushed 

Through canebrakes thick and wild, 
Once more struck down the forest-chief, 

And freed his captive child. 



Then one by one rose to his mind 

The hunters bold and true. 
Till all his long departed friends 

Came thronging on his view; 
And Clark, the greatest of them all. 

Formed for the first command, 
Stalked forth with chief-like step and air. 

And took him by the hand. 

— 41 — 



No more he saw— the mists grew thick 

Round life's receding shore ; 
He saw the spirit-land beyond, 

Nor dream of life dreamed more. 
His faithful stag-hound slowly rose 

From where he crouching stayed, 
And, lifting high his tawny throat, 

Long mournfully he bayed. 



A veil upon the gloomy tarn. 

The mists of evening float, 
While flocks of wild swans marshalled fly, 

With sad, sonorous note ; 
And yet the dusky hound bays deep 

Beside his master's form, 
Or tries in vain his icy hands 

With friendly tongue to warm. 



The hunters, guided by the sound. 

Came near the dark lake-shore. 
And found him stark and cold in death 

Beneath the sycamore. 
'Twas thus by far Missouri's stream. 

When autumn leaves were sere, 
As hunters round their firesides tell, 

Died Boone the pioneer. 



— 42 — 



THE BLOODWET GLOVE. 



Fair Lilian sits in her lonely bower, 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 
Her sire's a lord of wealth and power, 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

A knight is spurring o'er the plain 

Hearts grow cold and blasts grow chill ; 
Seven men at arms the knight have slain. 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

No true knight comes at Lilian's call, 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 
Seven dark-browed brothers stalk the hall. 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

They've brought fair Lilian a bloodwet glove. 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 

She said, "You've slain my own true love," 
Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

They've laid her in the churchyard low. 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 

Above her grave white roses blow. 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

— 43 — 



Her father kneels where she is laid, 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 
Seven sons are naught, my lily maid, 

Sing roundelay-Ia, fair ladie. 

Coronet, castle and wide demesne, 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 
I'd give to hear thy voice again, 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 

But, O to think that a bloodwet glove. 

Hearts grow cold and blasts blow chill ; 

Should be the end of Lilian's love. 

Sing roundelay-la, fair ladie. 



^44- 



THE WITCH. 



I 

She has robbed the rest from my pillow, 
And stolen sweet peace from my heart, 
The joy that welled in my heart 
And the slumbers that steeped my eyelids. 
With witchcraft and magical art. 



II 

She vexed me with dreams at the midnight, 

And bore me away to the stars. 

The wandering, malefic stars; 

She seethed me in steam of the lava 

That boiled up from Hecla's red scars. 

Ill 

She built me a bower of moonbeams. 
With a dome like Kubla Khan's, 
A pleasure-dome weird as the Khan's ; 
But Doubt at the doorway stood sentry ; 
His pass-word was, "Trust is not man's." 

— 45 — 



IV 

She buried a shaft in my bosom, 
That rankles by night and by day, 
And blights all the beauty of day; 
But behold how she smiles — mark her witchcraft- 
How she mocks in a magical way. 



Now what shall I do with a woman 
Who stabs with a wonderful knife, 
A poisonous, invisible knife ; 
Who drives the sleep from my pillow. 
And drains all delight from my life? 



VI 

Shall I make complaint to the judges? 
They'll declare she is honest and fair. 
They'll call her winsome and fair ; 
Shall I stir the village to drown her. 
Or strangle her with her black hair? 

VII 

What avail my incantations? 

Her glamour is proof against spell, 

Her charms overpower my spell ; 

The enchantress goes smiling and heedless 

Of woes that my tongue may not tell. 

— 46 — 



VIII 

Now tell me, ye cold-eyed bystanders ! 
Must a young man languish and die, 
Aye, gasp and wither and die, 
With no hope of release from the bondage 
And the spell of a witch's dark eye? 



IX 

Blessed saints ! come break this enchantment, 

Though I have to sail over the sea. 

Yea, sail o'er the limitless sea. 

And wander a desolate exile— 

From the weight of this yoke set me free. 



— 47- 



THE CAVALIER'S SWORD. 



My mistress is tlie bonny blade 
I wedded with my hand ; 
I love it more than any maid 
Who walks this blooming land. 

You love your lady's downcast eye ; 
I love the glances bright, 
That from my steel gleam fierce and high 
With cold and dazzling light. 

You praise your lady's slender waist, 
Her rounded, lissome form, 
Her spirit meek, her manners chaste. 
Her heart so true and warm ; 

My mistress hath a subtler spell. 
By cavaliers adored ; 
Her troth she keeps ; I love her well, 
My keen and flashing sword. 



— 48- 



THE SOLDIER'S WIDOW. 



She had a pleasant morning dream ; 
Alas ! that she should waken ; 
She lived, she loved, nor did it seem 
Her joy could e're be shaken. 

Their plighted vows had made them one, 
And O! she loved him dearly; 
Their course of love had scarce begun, 
And it must close so early. 

He wore the soldier's sword and plume, 
And when the trumpet sounded 
It called him to an early doom ;— 
They brought him to her wounded. 

In lingering pain some summer days 
His spirit seemed to hover, 
And then, in God's mysterious ways, 
Edith had lost her lover. 

Ah ! life is but a broken thread. 
That guides we know not whither ; 
Traced back it leads us to the dead 
Through flowers that fade and wither. 



49- 



'^ Adieu, plaisant pays de France, 

O ma patrie 

La plus cherie 
Qui as nourri ma jeune enfance — 
Adieu, France ! adieu nos beaux jours ! 
Le nef qui dejoint nos amours 
Na eu de moi que la moitie ; 
Une part te reste, elle est teinne ; 

Je la fie 

A ton amitie 
Pour que de I'autre 11 te souvienne." 

{Chanson of Mary, Queen of Scots.) 



MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS', FAREWELL. 



•'Adieu, plaisant pays de France. 



Farewell, beloved France! 
I ne'er shall see thee more; 
I cast my last fond glance 
On thy receding shore: 
Fast fall the salt, salt tears, 
That dim my aching eyes, 
And spectral forms and fears 
Dark o'er my pathway rise. 



Before me soon the steeps 
Of England's cliffs will loom, 
And seem, to her who weeps, 
The portals of a tomb ; 
And Scotland's rugged crags 
Will vex my hapless sight. 
While this winged dungeon drags 
Mary from lost delight. 



51- 



No more thy joys, dear France ! 
The idle hours beguile; 
No more the pleasant dance 
Provokes the wreathed smile ; 
Now gone are sportive words, 
The laugh, the tale, the song, 
Sunshine and flowers and birds, 
And pleasure's shining throng. 



Whate'er filled eye and ear, 
Whate'er cheered heart and mind, 
Whate'er seemed most, most dear, 
Wretched I leave behind ; 
O life so sweet, so gay. 
With bliss so brimming o'er! 
O rapture passed away, 
Never to bless me more ! 



Gone now the airy jest, 
The shapely, graceful mien 
Of nobles who addressed 
Each woman as a queen ; 
histead, stern Murray's form, 
Dark, rigid, clad in mail, 
And lowering as the storm. 
Stalks by with aspect pale. 

— 52 — 



Instead of bending priest, 
With wliisper soft and low, 
Absolving me, released 
Henceforth from sin and woe, 
Knox, with his strident voice 
And awful threatening arm. 
Points to the dreadful choice 
Of heresy or harm. 



Born of a Kingly line. 
Brave, beautiful and strong, 
What baleful planets shine, 
What great misfortunes throng, 
To mar the princely grace, 
To dim the splendid sheen, 
Of Scotland's royal race, 
Of Scotland's stricken queen ! 



Upon the deck I stand, 

And through the twilight strain 

To see again thy strand 

Across the billowy main ; 

But o'er the dark expanse, 

Mist shrouds thee from my view. 

O home! O hope! O France! 

My France ! a last adieu ! 



53- 



THE SONG OF OLAF. 



Listen, ye story tellers 
Of every age and clime; 
Stand in a magic circle 
Around the Lord of Rhyme ! 

Thou comest with runic saga, 
My Viking, fierce and bold ; 
Thy hilt is gold encrusted 
And blood is on the gold ! 

Grimly thou thrusteth forward 
To the center of the throng ; 
O son of Thor and Woden, 
Thou art the King of Song ! 

Thou art not given to dalliance, 
And rugged is thy rhyme ; 
It rings with clang of bucklers, 
And frothing flagons' chime! 

Winter gave the three teachers, 
Thy dam, the ancient pine, 
And the salt sea, thy sister. 
Who washed thy limbs in brine 

— 54 — 



But best beloved and dearest, 
The good sword at thy side, 
Proven in deadly onslaught 
Worthy to be thy bride ! 

Thy song is of the hemlock, 
And of the rushing sea, 
And the clash of steel on helmets ; 
Praise of thy teachers three. 

Ha! Ha! the war horse neigheth, 
When earth is strewn with slain : 
Thou chauntest the blood of warriors 
Bounding in every vein ! 

Grand is thy strange old legend, 
O Singer, fierce and wild, 
Nursling of storm and maelstrom. 
The arrowy lightning's child ! 

Shout loud then, Son of Woden, 
Where the red banner streams 
O'er wassail in Walhalla, 
When midnight splendor beams. 



■55- 



TO PYRRHA.* 

A ROMAN BALLAD BY Q. H. FLACCUS. 
(Horace, Book i, Ode 5) 



What lissome lad, perfumed with dripping otto, 
Woos thee, on roses, in thy pleasant grotto, 
Pyrrha? For whose caresses 
Dost bind thy yellow tresses. 

Simple in neatness? Alas how often 
Thy fickle love and gods he'll try to soften 
In vain, and watch with wonder 
Thy wind-tost waves and thunder — 

That greenhorn — who, thy golden youth enjoying, 
Hopes still to find thee fancy free, nor cloying 
Of amorous sweets, unheeding 
Thy tricksy gusts. But needing 

Pity are they whom thou untried deceivest. 
O strong Sea God, who on thy wall receivest, 
My sodden suit suspended, 
Behold my folly ended. 



See Note C at end of Book. 

— 56- 



THE ARGO. 



A MINYAN BALLAD, 



( Story old ; again retold.) 



From fair lolcos by the sea, 
The Minyan heroes bent their prow, 
To bring to Greece the Golden Fleece, 
Phrixus nailed to the beechen tree 
In Ares' grove to quit his vow. 



His ghost could not abide In peace, 
But haunted Pelias' palace halls, 
And, wandering pale, with mournful wail. 
Bade him bring back the Sacred Fleece, 
And hang it on th' ancestral walls. 



Now, royal Jason, Aeson's son, 
The rightful heir to Pelias' throne, 
An oath had sworn not to return, 
(By crafty Pelias' promise won). 
Till he had made the Fleece his own. 

-57- 



The Minyan heroes round him came 
Whom Centaur Cheiron with him taught 
On Pelion's height, to sing and fight, 
To wrestle, run and walk through flame, 
And crush with club the beast they fought ; 

The sword and spear in war to wield, 
The herbs that heal a wounded friend, 
To strike the lyre with soul on fire, 
While warriors clash with sword on shield. 
Quivers rattle and ashbows bend. 

First, Herakles came, strong and brave, 
Mighty and sad, to pain enured ; 
The lion's hide swung from his side, 
His voice was kind, his brow was grave, 
Weary he seemed of toils endured. 

Leda's twin sons, on milk white steeds, 
Castor and Pollux fast spurred in ; 
And Hylas fair, with golden hair ; 
Ancaios, who in planets reads 
What thing shall be, as if't had been ; 

Zetes and Calais, winged and fleet. 
Sons of the North Wind, apt to roam ; 
Peleus who strove for Thetis' love, 
The sea nymph with the silver feet, 
And won his bride from surf and foam ; 

— 58 — 



Mopsus, who knows the speech of bird, 
The meaning of the raven's croal<, 
Whose lips repeat the love tale sweet 
The ringdove told, that he hath heard 
Under the shade of the sacred oak ; 

Caineus, strongest of mortal men ; 
Idmon, priest of the Shining One ; 
Oileus tall, from his sire's hall; 
Telamon taller still, and then 
Butes, Pandaion's beautiful son. 

Coming, they came o'er mount and dale, 
Answering Jason's call from afar. 
Gladly to brave tempest and wave, 
Peril of rock, billow and gale. 
And shock of arms in panoplied war. 

To follow the prince who knew not fear, 
To hear his cheerful laughter ring. 
To see him stand with flashing brand, 
And then on the foe in strong career 
His mighty form like a torrent fling. 

Argus the wise, born by the strand. 
Who as a boy in the breakers rolled, 
(Whose fingers played with the silver braid 
Of Poseidon's robe as it trailed the sand), 
Prudent in thought, in action bold, 

-59 — 



Brought his brain and his cunning hand 
The sharp-beaked bark to plan and build, 
And made it fast from keel to mast, 
Clamping it tight with nail and band, 
While molten pitch its tight seams filled. 

Rigged was the ship from stem to sail, 
Ready to plunge through trackless deeps ; 
But neither spur nor whip can stir 
This seahorse to lift his wings to the gale. 
Or quit his stall on the windy steeps. 

Fast he stands on the shingly beach ; 
Over the gravel he will not crawl, 
The ship must dwell under a spell. 
That the bounding waves it cannot reach. 
Though hard the heroes tug and haul. 

Princely Jason fared to the North, 
Where Orpheus hid in lonely caves ; 
"Come, noble friend, your strong help lend 
And urge the fateful Argo forth 
To ride the crest of the glassy waves." 

Orpheus had lost his lovely queen; 
But on his golden lyre he played. 
Till from the grave the Dark King gave 
His wife to the light, but in its sheen 
She vanished again from sight— a shade. 

— 60 — 



Then Orpheus mourned in woods and rocks, 
Sore bereaved for his twice lost bride, 
While winds wailed low and streams ran slow, 
And following trooped the herds and flocks, 
And lion and stag crouched at his side. 

Orpheus lifted his large, sad eyes, 
And in his grasp took Jason's hand ; 
*^A friend's hard need is time for deed. 
For vigil, toil, and counsel wise, 
For pain and peril by sea and land — 

I will follow, and thou shalt lead." 
Then Orpheus smote his golden lyre ; 
With wings of flame, two dragons came. 
Each to serve as a hero's steed. 
And sped with them like meteor fire. 

At fair lolcos, like a rock. 
The Argo rests upon the ground; 
With idle hands the builder stands ; 
While, straggling like a simple flock, 
The Minyan chieftains wander round; 

When, like a thunderbolt on high 
Which hurtles from a driving cloud, 
The heroes twain spring to the plain 
From dragon-steeds that flash and fly, 
And burst upon the startled crowd. 

— 6J — 



Then Orpheus sang and music made 

Till every face was all aglow, 

And eyes looked bright and hearts grew light, 

And still upon his lyre he played, 

Now loud and strong, now soft and low. 

The Triton on the swelling wave 
Sounds far away his twisted shell ; 
And murmurous trees and sighing breeze 
And echoes from each grot and cave 
And scarped cliff and seaworn cell 

Gave sign the bard had touched and thrilled 
Great Mother Earth's broad, beating breast ; 
That life was there, was everywhere, 
That life the world and nature filled, 
Obedient to the poet's behest. 

Then to the Argo Orpheus spake, 

Laying his hand upon the prow, 

"Move, good ship, move; the bard's power prove, 

And Music's, and for her sweet sake. 

Seaward thy way take even now." 

Happed then a marvel. The great bark 
Straight toward the sea began to glide, 
Through sand and turf into the surf, 
Sure as an arrow to the mark, 
And, plunging, rode the foaming tide. 

— 62 — 



As when the summer tempest roars, 
Tossing the forest with its blast, 
Such was the shout that loud rang out 
Along the sandy Grecian shores, 
As Argo through the billows passed. 

The breeze blows fair, the sail is set, 
Strong arms bend hard upon the oars. 
With wind and tide the waves they ride ; 
But eyes at home with tears are wet. 
As Argo sails from Hellas' shores. 

To Pontic Kolchis they are bound. 
Far toward the rising of the sun. 
But months will go, and seasons flow, 
Ere their portentous quest is found. 
And years before their cruise is done. 

What things they saw, what splendid deeds 
The heroes wrought in days of old. 
This little verse may scarce rehearse ; 
The tonsured clerk a huge book reads 
Wherein the tale is duly told. 

Therein ye find the spells disclosed 
That King Aietes did devise, 
Jason to foil, with dule and toil ; 
But Jason wrought the tasks imposed, 
And through the Princess won the prize. 



No mortal arm could do the deed, 
Or 'scape the watchful dragon's harm, 
Save through the aid of the fair maid, 
Medea, who with mystic rede, 
Helped Jason break the fatal charm. 

For this fair princess of the land, 

Medea, Aietes' daughter wise, 

Whose dark hair shone like Night's black throne. 

Gave to the prince her lily hand. 

And on him looked with loving eyes. 

While in the sacred grove they strayed 
Medea gave her secret heart, 
Entire and swift, a royal gift, 
Like any foolish village maid, 
Despite her lore and magic art. 

From Kolchis with the Fleece they fled, 
And hard the Minyans plied the oar 
And crowded sail, though roared the gale 
And clouds were rushing overhead 
And billows beat the rocky shore. 

For swifter than the driving blast 
And fiercer than the howling storm. 
The angry King was following, 
With all his galleys rowing fast. 
And he in front with threatening form. 

— 64 — 



"Press hard," he cried; "Our galley's beak 
Drive through the Argo's oaken side; 
Gold shall be yours, brave Kolchian rowers, 
When we have slain the flying Greek, 
And in his blood our hands are dyed!" 

Then like Bellona, goddess dire, 

With beauty awful, yet divine, 

On the high stern, with eyes that burn, 

Medea stands, and kindles fire. 

And to the Gods of Death pours wine, 

"hifernal Deities!" she cries, 
" Ye force me to a bitter choice ; 
A brother's blood must stain the flood, 
Or else my princely Jason dies ; 
I hearken to my heart's true voice." 

" Bring forth Absyrtus, brother mine. 
Fond boy, whom I have nursed on knee ; 
This hateful- knife must take his life, 
For Hades claims his blood, not wine, 
And his young limbs must strew the sea." 

Then as they fled across the main, 

Aietes' galleys following fast, 

The King's black frown to woe sank down. 

When he beheld his dear boy slain, 

And on the waves his fair form cast. 

— 65 — 



The Witch Queen won the Golden Fleece, 
The beauteous, dark-browed Kolchian maid ; 
But with her knife her brother's life 
She ended, and thus gave release 
To Argo, when pursuit was stayed. 

The King went back in grief and pain, 
But blood that cries still soaked the deck ; 
Medea's spell that vanquished Hell 
Hid not from sight the dull, red stain 
That splashed the boards with gory fleck. 

Wonders by land, strange things by sea, 
The Minyan Heroes fill with awe ; 
But on the prow an oaken bough 
Showed that the Argo was not free 
From bloodguilt and from broken law. 

Then Jason voyaged months on days, 
Tracking ocean with tireless keel, 
With oar and sail, through snow and hail, 
Where noontide sun throws slanting rays 
That over the misty headlands steal. 

Drawn by an unseen Fate, they fled. 
To expiate the abhorred deed ; 
But peace came not — red was the blot, — 
And still, pursued by doubt and dread, 
The Heroes urged the white-winged steed. 



As Argo sailed along the beach, 
The rowers steadily bent their oars ; 
" The sea is wide," the rowers cried, 
" And far, O far, the prow must reach 
Or ever it graze the Grecian shores." 

On the sharp rocks the Sirens sing ; 

The salt sea waves crawl to their feet, 

With greedy lips to kiss the tips 

That rosy peep from sandals that swing 

In the surf, where the breakers burst and beat. 

The song they sang was sweet, O sweet ; 
—Bright their cheeks as the pink sea shell — 
From pearly throats floated such notes 
That the rowers rested, and cried, "Repeat;" 
For the music bound them with a spell. 

Then Butes' head dropped on his arm — 
Woe for Pandaion's beautiful son! — 
" Our thews are strong, and life is long," 
He sighed, and, " O brothers, where's the harm 
Of sleep for the weary when work is done." 

And, one by one, the grasp relaxed 
Of sinewy hand on bladed oar; 
The heavy lid dropped low and hid 
The tired eyes that closed o'ertaxed, 
And slowly drifted the ship toward shore. 

-67 — 



Then princely Jason seized the helm, 
And clear his manly accents rang, 
'' O brothers, wake, for Hellas' sake, 
Ere our bark the breakers overwhelm ! " 
But sweeter still the Sirens sang. 

To Orpheus then, with urgent prayers, 
Medea knelt and instant prayed, 
" Behold how sleep and numbness creep 
Over the long-haired Greeks ; ill fares 
The Argo now, without thine aid." 

"Orpheus!" the dark-browed princess cried, 
" Sound loud thy lyre, ere all be lost; 
The Argo drifts toward rocky rifts, 
Drifts and yields to the treacherous tide. 
Like a purple seaweed idly tost." 

Orpheus seized his lyre divine ; 
Strong and full rang out the strain, 
" Wake, Heroes, wake, for glory's sake. 
Smite with your oars the flashing brine, 
That Greece may greet your eyes again." 

" Think of your deeds of high renown. 
Think of the perils you have passed ; 
Nor happy Isles, nor Circe's smiles. 
In silken chains shall bind you down ; 
O be not lured to loss at last." 



" Mariner ! " sang the Siren, Rest 

In our harbor where winds are dumb ; 

A white-armed bride shall grace your side, 

Clad in golden tissued vest ; 

Come to the haven of happiness ; Come ! " 

"Rest! " sang Orpheus, "Such rest is rust. 
Rust that bites the edge from the blade ; 
Your bones will bleach on yonder beach ; 
And, crouching o'er your forgotten dust. 
Will wail for rest the unresting shade." 

Then Butes rose as in a maze ; 

His cheeks were flushed as if with wine ; 

With hasty stride, over the side 

He plunged, and the Sirens caught his gaze 

As he sank beneath the swirling brine. 

The Minyans fled the rower's bench, 
While Jason beat his brawny breast ; 
The Argo lurched, a raven perched 
On her mast head, and a cruel wrench 
Heaved the ship like a thing distressed. 

The voice of Orpheus, clear and shrill, 
Pierced, as the wind that pipes on high, 
Dull ears. He sang, " Hear ye the clang 
Of the gates of Hell ? Feel ye the chill 
Of the blast when they open for those who die?" 

— 69 — 



" Mlnyan Heroes ! Remember Greece, 
The vine-clad hill, the white-walled home, 
Your tender wives, the happy lives 
Ye have lived, will live in well earned peace, 
When after toils ye cease to roam." 

*' Think on the Golden Fleece ye bear. 
The precious prize your valor won. 
The high renown and glory's crown 
In times to come your fame shall wear, 
hi song and story handed down." 

'^ Bend to the oar once more, ye braves, 
O list not to the Sirens' chant, 
Think on the pure, and shun the lure 
Of the fiends who woo you to your graves ; 
Strive for the prize the High Gods grant." 

When warriors watch the weary night. 
And stand on post without relief, 
Till trumpets sound the guards' grand round, 
Then toss their plumes ready for fight. 
So looked the Heroes toward their chief. 

The Minyans row with measured plash ; 

—Blessed rhythm of rescue, hail ! — 

Its pulse beat saves from cruel graves 

The men whose oars through the white foam flash 

And as they leave, the Sirens wail. 

— 70 — 



IV 
THE ROSE. 



MELODIES AND THRENODIES. 



'Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the Rose.'' 

— Milton. 

You violets that first appear, 

By your pure purple mantles known ; 

What are you when the Rose is blown?" 

—IVotton. 



71 



THE ROSE. 



My rose blooms fair; O royal rose, 
So sweet and fresh with breath of May, 
Thou art the choicest child of spring ! 
How red thy ruby lips unclose, 
How bright the morning of thy day ! 
At sight of thee the small birds sing, 
The greenwood gay its reverence shows. 
And all rathe flowers their homage pay ; 
Thou art the queen of everything! 
But that was long ago, and now 
An icy hand is on thy brow; 
Sad winter reigns, and where art thou? 



•72- 



LOVE'S MORNING STAR. 



Beloved! thou art my morning star, 
Full robed in radiance, beauty born, 
That, flashing in its silver car. 
Breaks through the blushes of the morn. 

Star of my life ! the shades of night 

Flee from my feet and backward roll, 

And earth grows glad, and heaven more bright, 

In the calm splendor of thy soul. 

My clouded youth, forlorn and dim, 
Felt its first quickening in thy ray. 
Then burst into its morning hymn. 
Prescient of joy and glorious day. 



73 — 



CHRISTMAS COURTING. 



Gem-encrusted gleams the forest 
With ice diamonds laden low, 
And beneath the traveler's footstep 
Crunches crisp the frozen snow. 
Springing from the elm's dark column, 
Arches o'er the wintry way, 
Interlaced, an airy lattice, 
Traced with fringe of frosted spray. 



Dancing leaps the flickering firelight 
From the hearthstone to the floor ; 
Fervid glow the oaken embers, 
Like the ruby's central core; 
Gloomy near the pleasant ingle, 
Haunted by the demon doubt, 
I debate the wavering phantom 
And dejection's rabble rout. 

— 74 — 



Near me sits a modest maiden, 
With a sweet and earnest face, 
In wiiose eyes' dark depths are shadows 
Of the spirit, and the trace 
Of a holier, higher revealing- 
How an honest, human pride, 
Firmly fixed on truth and duty, 
May by grace be glorified. 



Slight her fairy form's perfection 
In its chaste and classic mould, 
As Pygmalion's dream of beauty 
Won to life from marble cold. 
" O," I murmured, " Could I move her, 
Fill her heart with love's soft glow, 
Sculptor ! I should far outvie thee,— 
But she's colder than the snow. 



Roaring with a joyous cadence. 
Peal the brazen-throated bells, 
And the swift sleigh's merry chorus 
The full Christmas anthem swells: 
Then my heart the omen welcomed— 
Could my faltering tongue but tell 
How far sweeter than the crystal 
Christmas chimes her accents fell ! 

— 75 — 



Till that moment, in her meekness, 
She had banished far the thought, 
Deeming wealth and power and glory 
Made the goal my manhood sought ; 
Dreaming not I was her captive, 
Bound by love and beauty's thrall. 
Not divining that I loved her. 
Till I knelt and told her all. 



Now another joyous Christmas 

On the world its splendor showers, 

But the snow wreath breathes the perfume 

Of the wreath of orange flowers ; 

And the sleigh bells' merry jangle 

And the tower's sonorous chime. 

Find a fuller, finer meaning 

In the happy aftertime. 



76. 



SYMPATHY, 



When throbs the aching heart 
With griefs it may not tell, 
O let me bear a part; 
Believe, I know them well. 

When sorrow's founts distill 
A potion to be quaffed, 
Though bitter, let me fill 
My cup and share the draught. 

Strive on, brave heart, hope, trust, 
Be faithful to the end ; 
The soul sinks not in dust ; 
Lean on me, tender friend. 



■77- 



TRANSMUTATION. 



Upon the noble river, 
The ancient, storied Rhine, 
The lights of evening shiver 
In a dark day's decline. 

The wearied boatman drifting. 
As in a waking dream. 
Beholds a castle lifting 
Its towers above the stream. 

Listless he lies, half gazing 
At the eyried turrets high 
And the rocky stronghold raising 
Its form against the sky. 

Sombre and dark it lowereth. 
While the gray donjon keep 
Its dusky shadow poureth 
Upon the pathway steep. 

It frowneth like the vision 
Of an evil life that's sped. 
When memory does its mission 
With record of the dead. 

— 78 — 



No ray of sunshine tender 
Softens the sombre scene, 
Till, with his royal splendor. 
As a monarch decks his queen. 

The dying Day King flingeth 
Forth with a liberal hand 
A flood of light that bringeth 
Joy to the darksome land. 

With ruby gleams each tower, 
Gold streams through every hall, 
Brightens my lady's bower, 
Bathes battlement and wall, 

Till lustrous shines each chamber. 
And, with rare jewels crowned. 
The keep, in robes of amber. 
Soft smiles where erst it frowned. 

And, springing from light arches. 
The castle seems to rise. 
Like a palace in the marches 
Neath Andalusian skies ; 

Like the celestial city 
St. John in Patmos saw, 
The realm of love and pity, 
Without a human flaw. 

— 79 — 



There all the laureled garlands 
That floating fancy wreathes, 
And the promise of those starlands 
Where inspiration breathes, 

Grow finer, purer, rarer ; 
As Dante in his dream 
Saw Beatrice grow fairer, 
In heaven's effulgent beam. 

'Twas thus my spirit darkly, 
Beneath the clouds of fate, 
Lifted its outlines starkly 
'Gainst scorn and wrong and hate, 

Till thy soul's sunshine, breaking 
Athwart the shadows grey, 
Made bright with light its waking 
To golden, royal day. 



80 — 



THE CONSOLER. 



Beloved ! When I think how calm, 
How true, how pure, thou art, 
The thought comes like a sovereign balm 
Poured on a bruised heart. 

My soul the blasts of passion parch. 
As sweeps the Simoom hot, 
Save where, like palms, thy virtues arch 
With verdure one cool spot. 

When anguish wrings, when sorrows thrill, 
My burthen thou dost share. 
Thy voice hath art, thy hand hath skill, 
To banish every care. 

When murky disappointments lower. 
When pain and grief bear sway. 
Thy very lightest touch hath power 
To charm them all away. 



— 81 — 



STEADFAST. 



All the homage my whole heart could render 
Was laid at thy feet in our youth, 
With a passion pure, constant and tender. 
And a trust in thy crystalline truth. 

Though care, disappointment and sorrow 
Have darkened my days with their gloom, 
Hope points to a happier morrow. 
When the flowers of evening shall bloom. 

But whatever of fate may betide me, 
Its bolts will assail me unmoved, 
Since thy spirit stands proudly beside me. 
With its love and its loyalty proved. 



THE YOUNG HUNTSMAN. 



Stay, wayfarer, stay, hast thou seen a young 

huntsman, 
In yon rocky valley, lone gorge in the mountains, 
W here leaps the bold torrent, with rush of wild waters ; 
Hast thou seen my brave lad, holding hard in the 

leashes 
Two sleuth hounds tight straining, and panting for 

quarry. 
Come striding along the steep slope of the ridges 
And grey spurs that buttress Mill Mountain's high 

backbone ? 
He bursts through the laurel, his tread like Apollo, 
The blast of his horn down the valley far ringing, 
The wild echoes waking from cliff, crag and cavern. 
Ah yes ! you would know him, thin flanked and 

broad shouldered, 
Tall, straight as a sapling, strong, surefooted, eager; 
His face like the morning when blow the fresh breezes 
And young dawn is flushing the East with its roses. 
See, his brown hair is damp with the dew of the 

day spring ; 
His hazel eyes, flecked with a scintillant amber. 
Are translucent wells of clear truth and soft beauty, 
Out-matching the stars "that are sinking to slumber. 
He moves like the morning, yea. King of the morning, 
As fair, pure, and sweet as the dawn in its coming. 



No more, no more, no more ; no more, alas, forever, 
Down the piney slopes and through the mountain 

gorges, 
Will Albert drive the deer, or drink with welcoming 

breath, 

hills, the free air blowing o'er your grassy glades, 
With balm of spruce and cedar laden, or fragrant 
With the dainty sweetbrier's delicate breath ; 

No more with radiant face look toward the rosy 

dawn. 
Or greet the imperial East with heart all glowing ; 
No more, no more, no more, forever! 

1 hear his horn's clear call. O'er leagues of land 

and sea. 
Far down the lonely valley where 1 stand, it comes 
From realms beyond the stars, from yon exalted crest 
Of truth's fair heights, "that lifts in living light. 
Bright with the dawn of heaven. Yea, lad, I gladly 

come, 
in answer to thy call, if strength to me be given 
In thy sure track, with footstep tremulous, to tread. 
Until I stand beside thee, grasp thy steady hand. 
And with thee walk in joy the Hills Delectable. 
O fair and well loved youth, my spirit follows thine, 
Forever, yea, forever, evermore. 



QUEENS OF THE PAST. 



Queens of the past! Do I envy the ages 
That believed that your beauty was sent from above, 
As solace, or scourge, to the warriors and sages, 
Who shipwrecked their souls with insatiate love? 



Thou, Cleopatra, for Antony dying ! 

I know yet another far fairer than thee ; 

The west wind repeats to my heart her faint sighing ; 

She sighs, O ye zephyrs ; her sighs are for me ! 

Helen, of heroes the queen and subduer! 
Worthier the guerdon of beauty than thee, 
There is another, tenderer, truer, 
Watching and waiting for me, ah for me ! 

O uncreated ! thou goddess upspringing ; 
Divine Aphrodite, from foam of the sea! 
Thy handmaiden comes to me smiling and singing, 
As memory leads her all lovely to me. 

Thy girdle she's playfully swinging and flinging, 
Like a toy of her girlhood to me, ah to me ; 
Her charms to my arms and her beauty she's 

bringing. 
Fairer, O goddess of beauty, than thee! 

— 85 — 



DIVINEST OF WOMEN, 



O my beloved, 
My darling, my angel. 
Bright bird of the morning, 
Whose chirp was so pleasant, 
Whose song was so thrilling, 
Whose silence was golden, 
Thou wast a sweet singer ! 
Ah, why art thou silent? 



Never another. 
No, not Cleopatra, 
Not Helen, half goddess, 
Nor yet any other 
Whom poet hath sung of, 
Or dreamer hath dreamed of 
In visions of morning 
When forms of fair women 
Have burst on his seeing, 
Compel the soul surges. 
The tides of my being. 
To lift their crests toward her. 
Like thee, of all women. 
The noblest, most charming ; 
Fair sister of angels, 
Divinest of women ! 



— 86 — 



To have thee and hold thee 
Were better than empire, 
Were better than glory, 
Were a foretaste of heaven, 

joy of my spirit ! 

1 have held and possessed, 
Possessed and adored thee, 

I have treasured and loved thee 

I cannot now lose thee, 

I will not now lose thee, 

I will cling to and hold thee, 

Forever and ever. 



For thee, through the gloom 

And the valley of shadows 

I would walk, though black Hades, 

With portals of horror, 

Should yawn to receive me. 

Ah, sooner than lose thee, 

I would tread the hot embers, 

Where ghosts of perdition 

Mow, mutter and threaten. 

If the universe hold thee, 

My spirit shall find thee. 

By leaping its chasms. 

By flights through abysses, 

By an eternal upward, 

A striving for Heaven, 

Where thou wilt be surely, 

O sister of angels, 

Divinest of women ! 



-87 — 



stretch forth thy hand 
From the lattice of Heaven, 
To where, my Beloved, 

In gloom and the darkness 
Of Earth, I look upward! 
Through the mist and the murk 

1 gaze, O how tenderly, 
Reverently, lovingly. 
Waiting thy coming. 

Be thou the swift angel 
To meet my worn spirit, 
When baffled and beaten 
By sin in life's battle, 
A message of mercy 
Shall rescue the vanquished. 
Thy white hand shall lift me. 
Who loved and still loves thee 
Thy strength bear me upward 
To realms of the ransomed, 
O guardian, thrice saintly, 
Fair sister of angels, 
Divinest of women. 



— 88 



V 
MARGUERITES. 



"Of all the flowers in the mead 
Then love I most these flowers white and red, 
Such as men callen daisies in our town." 

— Chaucer, 



The little daisy that at evening closes." 

— Spenser. 



— 89 — 



MY LADY. 



1 named her, since I did not further dare 
To call her, as I would, by title tender, 
" My Lady," hoping she would kindly wear 
This token of the homage that I render. 

And so about her, as some marble column 

The morning glory decks with varied lustre, 

All thoughts and aspirations, sweet or solemn, 

All hopes and fears still climb and cling and cluster. 

On other tongues she may have titles higher, 
Wherein their admiration would enshrine her, 
But symbol of all charms that men desire 
And bind the heart, "My Lady" is the finer. 

To me it means, for wounds, a balm and healing, 
And for the sinking soul a resurrection. 
Surcease of strife and friendship's noble feeling, 
The end of doubt, the sweet sway of affection. 



— 90 — 



MY LADY'S NAME 



When 1 speak of my lady to women and men, 
When I speak to my lady before her fair face, 
When I fondly address her with tongue or with pen, 
I use the strong name of her honorable race. 

But O when I lift up my heart from the sod, 
And it utters its voices, the word is divine, 
It phrases this beautiful handmaid of God 
In terms of its own, and claims her as "mine." 

Yes, in dreams of the day, and dreams of the night, 
In the silence profound of my desolate hours, 
She comes like a vision tender and bright, 
The fairest of women, the queen of the flowers. 

Ah, then I may speak with unloosened tongue, 
'To the vision I see in her love-gilded shrine, 
And my heart in the song that the ages have sung 
Will repeat the wild echo, " Thou'rt mine, only 
mine." 



— 91- 



LIFE'S PUZZLE. 



O heart, why dost thou beat so hard 
Against thy prison bars? 
Thy wings will break against the guard 
That shuts thee from the stars. 

The soul that from its hermitage 
Toward heaven would soar upborne, 
Must, like the bird that scorns its cage, 
Sink down with plumage torn. 

Accept thy fate, poor wayward thing; 
What right hast thou to bliss? 
Time ends its pageant — death will bring 
The meaning of all this. 

But O how long the hours seem. 
How dark the little space, 
And life how like an ugly dream, 
Unlighted by her face! 



■92. 



HYMETTUS HILL, 



King Summer sets his golden throne 
On fair Hymettus hill, 
Which, girdled with a fairy zone, 
Rises right royally and lone, 
Like some strong human will. 

Mine eyes upon its wild marsh waste 
Will never rest again. 
Nor e'er my roving fancy haste 
This Bee-Land's bittersweet to taste,- 
Its mingled bliss and pain. 



93. 



THE QUEEN. 



There was a queen : wide was her sway 
O'er landscape green, o'er summer day, 
O'er hearts of men, or grave or gay ; 
A queen alway ! 

And O that queen was passing fair, 
And bright the gold sheen of her hair; 
Hers, grace of mien and beauty rare ; 
O fair, too fair! 

Brave suitors came from East, from West, 
To stir love's flame in her white breast ; 
By all, her name was blessed, as best— 
The very best! 

A pilgrim gray stood at her gate ; 
He came that way— it was his fate ; 
*' O lady, may I stand and wait, 

E'en at thy gate?" 

" The winds blow sharp, their blasts sweep chill, 
They weave a warp of music shrill ; 
I have a harp to work my will ; 

It will, it will." 

— 94 — 



"O minstrel old, sit by my hearth, 

The night is cold ; come share our mirth ; 

Thy speech is bold ; but show its worth, 

For worth is worth." 

"When Paynim guile quelled our crusade. 
In Cyprus Isle," he answer made, 
" A little while my steps were stayed ; 

I dreaming stayed ! " 

" There at a shrine, with leafy screen, 
A form divine, a glorious queen, 
Made this harp mine—Venus, I ween. 

That Goddess Queen ! " 

He smote the strings ; the music rang. 
And words with wings soared as he sang : 
' Tis Love that sings ! His hopes will hang 
On how Love sang. 

"O bard mine own," the bright queen cried, 
"Thou, thou alone, here at my side 
Shalt share this throne; I'll be thy bride; 
Alone thy bride! " 

She gives her hand; she gives her heart; 
The bard will stand, touched by her art, 
A figure grand ! This is love's part ; 

Such is Love's art! 

— 95 — 



LITTLE LADY. 



Little lady, why deny me? 

Why so coy and I so eager? 

Friendship's diet is too meagre ; 

If you trust me, why not try me? 

I'll be true, as thou art dearest; 

Tell me, faint heart, what thou fearest? 

Do not fly me; why not try me? 

Little lady, pray surrender; 
You will never know another. 
Be he lover, friend, or brother. 
Who will feel a love as tender; 
Who'll so shield thee, honor, cherish, 
Till this world's sad pageant perish; 
Pray surrender; nay, surrender. 



— 96- 



SWEET MARGUERITE. 



My lady is in town; all hail to her; 

Let incense rise, rare frankincense and myrrh, 

Odors of all things sweet, 

Faint vetiver and tea rose, greet 

Thee, sweetest sweet. 

Sweet Marguerite! 

Let joy expand and music fill the ear ; 
Glad earth make melody; I gladly hear 
My heart, in every beat, 
Echoes of that dear voice repeat; 

Again I meet 

Sweet Marguerite. 

O splendor of the golden day arise! 
Thou art not brighter than my lady's eyes. 
Nor than her smiles that meet 
The lover kneeling at her feet; 

Thy little feet. 

Sweet Marguerite! 



— 97 — 



VETIVER. 



Delicate, faint and fine 

Is Vetiver, 

As tlie perfume of old wine, 

As that little glove of thine, 

As the first flower of the year. 

Delicate, fine and faint 
Is Vetiver, 

As the legend of a saint, 
With never an earthly taint, 
With never a mortal fear. 

Subtle and sweet and strong 

Is Vetiver; 

What powers to it belong ! 

Its fragrance hath sight and song 

To draw the distant near. 

Subtle and strong and sweet 

Is Vetiver; 

It is mighty and fleet. 

It hath wings, it hath feet. 

To bring thine image here. 

Fatal thy. sweets that thrill. 
Rare Vetiver! 

That bind the wrestling will. 
And the soul with the senses fill 
To breed hopes so deadly dear. 

— 98 — 



VI 
LAUREL AND MYRTLE. 



How long, O Lord, how long!" 



Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more. 
Ye myrtles brown—." 



— Lycidas. 



— 99 



FLETCHER OF SALTOUN. 

A PRELUDE. 



I 

Fletcher of Saltoun's wisest saw 
Said, " Let me make the songs, 
And they who will may frame* the law 
I'll right my people's wrongs." 



II 

When freedom languishes she'll hear 
With joy my trumpet call, 
And Csesar's soul shall quake with fear 
Within his guarded hall. 



Ill 

Sentries will wake upon their posts. 
Whene'er its clear notes ring; 
And vain are usurpation's boasts, 
While soaring spirits sing. 

— 100 — 



IV 

Tyrants may ply the rack, the scourge, 
Or forge the galling chain ; 
Fetters shall fall ; I sound their dirge 
In freedom's martial strain. 



The wrong may lift its gilded lies 
For worship on each shrine ; 
True hearts will pay no sacrifice, 
While live these songs of mine. 



-101- 



THE TORCH OF LIBERTY. 



Our patriot sires drew down from heaven 
The fire divine of liberty; 
They heard it in the thunder crash, 
They seized it from the lightning's flash, 
To them and their the boon was given 
Forever to be free. 



They proudly placed in freedom's fane 
The sacred torch of liberty; 
Its radiant light beamed o'er the world, 
Bright blazoned on the flag unfurled, 
Which martyr blood, poured forth like rain. 
Bought for the brave and free. 



Be this the quenchless, vestal flame 
Our swords shall guard with jealousy. 
And 'round its altar, hand in hand, 
Let States, like sister sovereigns, stand, 
While loyal hearts, with one acclaim. 
Declare that man is free. 

— 102 - 



Its subtle, subterranean fires 

Shall silent cross the stormy sea, 

Till force and fraud and thrones and kings 

Are cast aside as noxious things. 

And nations in harmonious choir 

Proclaim the world is free. 

1854. 



— 103 



JOHN MITCHELL. 



He was a glorious Celt; his soul was free, 
And felt his country's wrongs, but not her fears 
Of that proud Sassenach supremacy, 
The seed and fruit of Erin's woes and tears. 

His nature, rugged as some granite range. 
Which lifts its crest to meet the tempest blast, 
A front presented, sullen, lofty, strange, 
A druid's shadow on a dull age cast. 

O, Mitchell ! well thy spirit knew to sing 
Down the long vista of a martial age. 
Whose keynote in thy war cry seemed to ring, 
Whose tumults in thy bosom swelled with rage. 

He hurled defiance at the mighty foe, 

Whose iron heel was on his country's neck; 

His thunders shook the lethargy of woe. 

His lightnings blazed around the shattered wreck. 

But, ah too strong the alien's mailed hand! 
The countless years of servitude too strong ! 
The patriot sinks with his beloved land. 
Beneath the immemorial reign of wrong. 



— 104 — 



THE FARMER'S GRANGE. 

Air:— The Shan Van Vocht. 



I 

O ! shall the railroads rule the land ? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
Shall the railroads rule the land? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
They shall not rule the land, 
Nor keep the upper hand, 
For the people will withstand, 

Says the Farmers' Grange; 
We won't crouch at the command 
Of the swindling, murd'rous band. 
For the people will withstand. 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 

II 

O! we have asked our rights in peace, 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
We have asked in vain for peace, 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
O! we have prayed for peace, 
But your troublings will not cease. 
And your villainies increase, 

Says the Farmers' Grange ; 
We have prayed in vain for peace 
To the men who rob and fleece; 
We are bound to have release, 

Says the Farmers* Grange. 

— 105 — 



Ill 

And where will the true men meet? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
Where will the true men meet? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
O ! where will all true men meet 
And their true oaths there repeat, 
And the brethren all then greet? 

Says the Farmers' Grange; 
On the field of unreaped wheat, 
In the barn and in the street, 
And they mean not to be beat, 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 



IV 

Then what will these true men do? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
What will the true men do ? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
They will show a thing or two 
To the bribing, swindling crew, 
And give every man his due, 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
They'll begin the thing anew, 
And give every man his due. 
And do justice to the true, 

Says t«he Farmers' Grange. 



— 106 — 



And what color will they wear? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
What color will they wear? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
What color shall I say 
But the blue, mixed with the grey ; 
It will make a stout array, 

Says the Farmers' Grange : 
No Craydee Mobiliay 
Will suit our time of day. 
But the blue mixed with the grey. 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 



VI 

And will Columbia then be free? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
Will Columbia then be free? 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 
Yes ! Columbia shall be free 
From the centre to the sea; 
So ! Hurrah for Liberty ! 

Says the Farmers' Grange; 
Columbia shall be free 
From the centre to the sea, 
So ! Hurrah for Liberty ! 

Says the Farmers' Grange. 

— 107 — 



THE STRIKE ENDED. 
(a voice from homestead.) 



King Capital hath won the day, 
And set his heel on Labor's neck, 
And Wealth resumes her ancient sway; 
The vanquished worker must obey, 
Low crouching at her beck. 

"Order again in Warsaw reigns," 
With iron jaws still grinds the mill ; 
While Justice, sneering in her fanes. 
Forges for power the law's strong chains, 
To bind the human will. 

The lion, on the open plain. 
His wily keeper's limbs would rend ; 
But, caged, he chafes, with angry mane, 
And gnaws his prison bars in vain— 
To hunger, rage must bend. 

And thou, poor starving wretch, dost know 
That all thy sufferings were for naught; 
For Wealth hath said, "Let it be so."— 
Let the poor eat their bread in woe. 
Which tearful toil hath bought. 

— 108 — 



Your masters loudly, proudly, tell 
That ye are free, nor scourge, nor rod, 
With force the body can compel. 
Where dwells, as in a citadel. 
The soul— a spark from God. 

Are ye then free, but must not speak 
When agony the spirit bows? 
Sit in dumb woe and let want wreak 
Its ravage on the pallid cheek- 
So much the law allows. 

Since ye are free, be ye content 
With filthy rags and mouldy crust; 
By freedom — to the poor — is meant 
Toil till the upright soul is bent 
And sinks into the dust. 

Bow to the yoke ; be calm, be still ; 
Your masters' hearts are hard as stone; 
For how can av'rice gorge its fill, 
How can oppression work its will. 
Without you sweat and groan ? 

Their ample arms in one embrace 
Clasp close the whole of humankind. 
Save that poor starving kindred race 
Who stare them daily in the face. 
To whom their eyes are blind. 

— 109 — 



Yes, blind the eyes that will not see, 
And deaf the ears that will not hear ! 
Foul hypocrites in heart are ye, 
Who vaunt afar your charity. 
And trample on the near. 

One argument they heed— the drum- 
When glittering pikes throng at the gate, 
And armed men, with bodeful hum, 
Come, as the legioned locusts come, 
To avenge, to desolate. 

With gun in hand, ask what you may. 
They'll grant you that and offer more ; 
They fear the people's stout array. 
They dread rebellion's bloody fray 
And insurrection's roar. 

Trust then no more to servile prayer 
For justice from your cruel lords ; 
Come like the wild beast from your lair. 
The belt draw tight, the arm make bare, 
And use your whetted swords. 



110 — 



MAM'SELLE GUILLOTINE. 



SONG OF THE ANARCHIST. 



I 

Thou art a fine lady, Mam'selle Guillotine; 

Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho! 
Thy ways are so killing, thy glance is so keen. 

Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho ! 
Thy slim fingers bind to the block for the blade. 

And as bright as its sheen 

Is thy face, O my queen, 
When gayly thou endest our last promenade 
And sendest our souls to the nethermost shade 
(With heads in a basket and hearts in a row). 
But O for the bliss 
Of thy sweet last kiss! 
Yet we'll laugh as we quaff 

To thy health ; so, ho, ho ! 

Ha, ha! Ho, ho! 

Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho! 



— Ill— 



I 

But when the time comes, Mam'selle Guillotine, 

Ah, ah, ah ! Oh, oh, oh ! 
For the wrenching of hearts, thou'lt be there, I ween ; 

Ah, ah, ah ! Oh, oh, oh ! 
For the breaking of hearts is, I fancy, thy trade, 

And thy garb and thy mien* 

Are the stateliest e'er seen, 
Befitting the form of the beautiful maid 
Who last clasped the neck of him who hath prayed 
(With heads in a basket and hearts in a row) 

And gave him the bliss 

Of her last sweet kiss. 
So we sigh, as we die, 

"Here's to death;" Oh, oh, oh! 

Ah, ah ! Oh, oh ! 

Ah, ah, ah ! Oh, oh, oh ! 



— 112- 



SUMMER MUSINGS. 



The evening is warm and drowsy, 
And the grasshopper loudly sings, 
And sweetly falls on the weary ear 
The hum of a thousand wings— 
Of the myriad wings of insects 
That flash in the setting sun, 
Till sheen and irised shimmer 
Stream mingled into one. 

The beaks of the birds are drooping, 

Their twitter just meets the ear, 

But the katydid pipes her ceaseless note. 

Monotonous, shrill, and clear; 

And I dreamily stand and listen 

On the maple-crested hill. 

While memory casts a sad eclipse 

On a faint and thwarted will. 

Oh ! for the fabled lotus 
That takes from pleasure the past. 
Till the vivid and beautiful present 
Shuts out its shadows vast. 
And fills the eye with the glitter 
And the ear with the hum of a fly. 
While the deeds of our chosen chieftains 
Vanish from sight and die. 

— 113 — 



Oh ! for the blessed nepenthe 
Which can teach the serf to forget 
That his race is the line of heroes, 
That the eyes of his women are wet 
For the warriors they sent forth to battle, 
For the martyrs they sent forth to die, 
While he lives with his shackles upon him. 
And utters to heaven no cry. 



— 114 — 



DEFEAT. 

1866. 



The bow is broken, and the spear is shattered, 
And all our miglity leaders are laid low; 
Our war-worn legions to the winds are scattered 
Before the hosts of an insulting foe. 

The chariots are o'erthrown, the sword is rusting 
That bore the dint of many a knightly blow; 
And hearts that bowed before thee, sad, yet trusting. 
Look up through tears — it is so dark below. 

The hand that wrought such miracles of valor 
Is gyved with steel behind the dungeon-bar; 
The brow is blanching with the prison-pallor 
That flushed exultant in the front of war. 

Those who have conquered treat us like dumb cattle, 
And herd and goad, where'er they choose to drive. 
Men who have breathed the fiery breath of battle. 
The dauntless comrades who the wreck survive. 

We know, thank God, that now means not forever. 
That death can give us but a moment's pain— 
A plunge into the dark mysterious river. 
To join beyond our band of martyred slain. 

— 115 — 



And do they think to breathe is then so gainful, 
That we will hug a slavish life in chains ; 
To cross the stream, like Jackson, were less painful, 
Or fall like him who led on Shiloh's plains. 

We look not back with shame ; our deeds were 

glorious ; 
God weigheth all; man's scope is incomplete; 
Earth chanteth hymns alone to the victorious ; 
He smiteth victory, and may bless defeat. 



-116 



THE GETTYSBURG DEAD. 



[An answer to the threat to plough up the graves of Con- 
federates buried at Gettysburg. After these lines were written, 
the ladies of Richmond, Virginia, removed the bodies of our 
soldiers from Gettysburg to Hollywood Cemetery. They have 
been diligent in all good works, for they have loved much.] 



They call to the Southrons from the North, 

"Come, take your dead away. 

Or we'll plough the sod 

And break the clod 

That cover the rebel clay." 

The loyal hands that carried the flag, 

The men who wore the blue, 

On whatever earth 

They had their birth, 

They are counted good and true. 

They raise for their own the sodded graves, 

And range them row by row; 

And the billowy grounds 

Lift up in mounds — 

The furrows of death and woe. 



117 



And thus with proud acclaim is filled 

The cemetery wide, 

While high o'er the graves 

Splendidly waves 

The banner for which they died. 

Our dead died too for the dear-loved land 

Whose soil had given them birth, 

And where'er they fell 

It served them well — 

A handful of mother-earth. 

No pious hands have lifted the dust 

Of men who nobly died, 

But they sleep a sleep 

As sweet and deep 

As if urned in marble pride. 

A voice by the ear of faith is heard, 

"My people keep your trust; 

Behold with your eyes 

Beyond the skies 

That your heroes are not dust." 

Their home is with those who fought for truth, 

For God, for fatherland ; 

With the blest they dwell 

And not where swell 

These battle-scarred mounds of sand. 

— 118 — 



They live on the lips of Seraphim 

And on the tongues of men ; 

In the unheeded grave, 

Or 'neatli the wave, 

Their glory will bloom again. 

Then, tender mother! weep not thy boy. 

Though no stone record his name ; 

In brave hearts he'll dwell, 

When minstrels tell 

His story of deathless fame. 



— 119 — 



THE GOLDEN AGE. 



I know our nation's vernal bloom is over; 
Vanished the springtide's dear, delicious days, 
When simple toil amid the fragrant clover, 
With youth and health and hope, gave God the 

praise — 
Ah! shall we walk again in virtue's ways? 



They say the storm has ceased its angry motion 
Alcyone is sitting by the sea, 
Her bird auspicious brooding on the ocean ; 
That peace is coming back to you and me — 
But yet, I ask you, are our people free? 



They tell me Ceres pours her horn of plenty, 
That barns are brimmed with heavy sheaves of 

gold. 
One sack is sown, the reaper gathers twenty, 
The marvels of our wealth tongue hath not told — 
But have we now the rights we had of old? 

— 120 — 



They say our white- winged commerce breaks the 

barrier 
Of earth's remotest limits for her spoil, 
And laden like a bee, far flying carrier, 
Brings tribute back of wine and spice and oil — 
But brings she back content with all her toil? 



Tell me, O Messenger, absolved from error! 
Shall we e'er see again the days of old. 
When sovereignty was swayed in love, not terror. 
Duty was strong, and honest worth was bold, 
And mighty truth prevailed, not sordid gold? 



•121- 



PATRICK HENRY. 



O grand young tribune of our western land, 
Who first defied the high embattled might 
Enshrined in church and planted on the height 
Of kingly sanctity, at thy command, 
Like Joshua who bade the sun to stand 
In his celestial course for Israel's light, 
The monarch's power was stayed, and human right 
Smote haughty Gibeon with a heavy hand! 

And thou, the very voice of eloquence. 

As if some god spake in thine accents clear. 

Didst call to liberty her chosen race 

And hurl the tyrant from his pride of place ; 

— A simple man, and sweet, and yet a seer, 

Heaven sent, to be thy people's strong defense! 



122 — 



THE PATRIOT SOUTH. 



Look backward and before thee, patriot South, 
At the clear prospect of thy prime 
And the full splendor of the after time, 
—Though battle-scarred and wet with tears — 
And lay thy finger on thy silent mouth ; 
Forget regrets and banish idle fears. 
And greet with words of welcome all the coming 
years ! 



II 



For who can rob thee of thy heritage" 

Of memorable deeds and thought. 

By which with blood our liberties were bought 

And a great federal nation born. 

Which, strengthening in each successive age. 

To the whole world, despite the tyrant's scorn, 

Hath heralded the light of freedom's stirring morn. 



123- 



Ill 

And who shall dare to put upon thee shame, 
Sith thou hast met the world in arms, 
Nor shunned the shock, nor yielded to alarms, 
But when the nations joined the hunt. 
Still stood at bay and won immortal fame 
By peerless chivalry, when front to front, 
Thou'st met unblenched thy fivefold foe in battle's 
brunt. 



IV 

Thou hadst a dream, a mighty federation, 

Whose sovereign states looked not beyond 

The strict intent and spirit of the bond 

To which they had given a free assent, 

Thus drawing into one grand constellation 

These many separate stars, which henceforth went 

In heavenly harmony, a cosmic parliament. 



This was thy vision — a great federation 

Of States which held, without a flaw. 

Their Statehood, and dispensed their civil law 

Within their realms, yet to the world 

Stood up Titanic — a Briarean nation. 

Solid against Olympian lightnings hurled — 

Where'er its starry banner was on high unfurled. 

— 124 — 



VI 

The poles on which should turn thy polity 
Were sovereign selfhood in the State, 
By its own will its acts to regulate, 
Bounded but by the compact framed ; 
And next, before the law, equality; 
So that dependence should not once be named, 
Nor in the nation should the weakest State be 
shamed. 



VII 

As when, with earthquake, bursts Vesuvius, crashes 

The thunderbolt, the lightning strikes, 

And the volcano breaks its rocky dikes. 

Pouring red floods o'er field and plain. 

And buries cities in its showers of ashes, 

So happed it when war, with its horrid train, 

Dissolved thy noble dream, and left a nation slain. 



VIII 

Thy hedge is broken, and the wild beasts ravage 
Thy garden and vineyard; desolate 
Are thy high places, and the hand of fate 
Is heavy on thee ; then a swarm, 
Foul as a Tartar horde, and yet more savage. 
Rush from their hive to rend thy mangled form. 
And suck thy streaming blood while yet the quarry's 
warm. 

— 125 — 



IX 

But, on thy fields of combat, not more splendid 
Shone thy stern valor, baffling fate. 
Until it sank beneath o'erwhelming weight. 
Than beamed thy dauntless fortitude, 
When hope itself grew pale, and all seemed ended 
Beneath the reign of misrule which ensued — 
But steadfast still thou'st stood, in triple mail 
endued. 



Constant and true to every sound tradition 

Of freedom, current in thy blood — 

That Anglo-Norman strain which has withstood 

Through centuries all lawless power, 

And held with polar fixedness its mission — 

Thou hast borne every wrong, and waited for the 

hour 
When thou could'st crush the nettle, and thus grasp 

its flower. 

XI 

Whilst wildly raged the social revolution. 

With a wise patience for thy guide. 

Thy hand hath checked the despot's haughty stride 

And anarchy's unlicensed sway. 

With one appeal — that to the Constitution — 

And thou hast held to freedom's ancient way. 

Until, for thee, at last there dawns a brighter day : 

— 126 — 



XII 

The dayspring from on high which wakes the nation 
To stay corruption at its fount 
And hold its servants to a strict account, 
Enforcing probity and riglit, 
And with strong bit to curb centrahzation, 
Restoring commonwealths their lawful might, 
Which seemed foiever quenched in blackest central 
night. 



XIII 

Upon the land now breathes an inspiration 
Of sweet charity, new-born again, 
And reason returning to her lordly reign ; 
So that the promise of our prime 
Still lives ; and, to the loftiest station, 
From lowly sheepfolds — for events thus chime 
With heaven's will — is raised a man ripe for the 
time: 



XIV 

A ruler, calm and strong and resolute, 

Self-poised, nor bent on selfish ends, 

And knowing neither enemies nor friends 

In duty's full and fair discharge; 

But striking boldly at the evil root 

Of falsehood, and, with purpose pure and large, 

Smiting in front corruption's brazen helm and 4arge. 

— 127 — 



XV 

Such then our hope — a people roused to action, 
With conscience deeply, strongly, stirred, 
Demanding honest deed as well as word, 
And equal justice and unsullied hands 
And the whole country's weal, instead of faction ; 
Thus shall consent be forged by love to bands 
Stronger than force's fetters, or power's harsh 
commands. 



XVI 

Thus in the march of time and long procession 

Of coming ages, year on year. 

We mark the great republic's proud career, 

Like Philip's phalanx, manifold, 

With bucklers linked, one front against aggression; 

Till freedom's perfect vision is unrolled, 

And man, with eye unsealed, its glories shall behold. 



128 — 



VII 
BRAMBLE AND BERRY. 



" Hangs odes upon hawthorns, 
And elegies on brambles." 



-As You Like It. 



''Scarlet hips and stony haws 

Or blushing crabs or berries that emboss 

The bramble." 

— The Task. 



129- 



THE MASTER. 

AN IMITATION. 



Q. Tell me, O Sage! What is the true ideal? 

A. A man I knew,— a living soul and real. 

Q. Tell me, my friend ! Who was this mighty 

master? 

A. The child of wrong, the pupil of disaster. 

Q. Under what training grew his lofty mind? 

A. To cold neglect and penury resigned. 

Q. What honors crowned his works with wealth 

and praise? 

A. Patience and faith and love filled all his days. 

Q. And when he died what victories had he won? 

A. Hope and humility— his work well done. 

Q. What mourning nations grieved above his bier? 

A. A sorrowing eye dropped there a loving tear. 

Q. But History, then, will consecrate his sleep? 

A. His name is lost; angels his record keep. 



— 130 — 



THE RETURN OF YOUTH. 



O for the dews of the morning! 
O for the flowers of Spring, 
When bird choirs give tremulous warning, 
Ere the groves with melody ring ! 
Could we but bring, 
. By the lyre's harmonious string. 
Or our prayers all vainly offered, 
Your uncloying sweets again, 
We would purchase with our pain 
The gifts divine that Zeus then proffered. 
Great Zeus who now our incense spurneth 
But not again, 
But not again, 
Our youth returneth. 

Spring Cometh back with its blooming, 
Morn will return with its dews. 
But the hours all pleasures entombing, 
To reopen their portals refuse. 
We stand and muse 
And the fleeting moments lose. 
While revolves the hinge close swinging 
Crystal gates upon our track, 
Through which vainly we look back, 
And hear the seasons singing, singing; 
" In vain, in vain, the sad soul yearneth, 
We come not back. 
We come not back, 
Youth ne'er returneth." 

— 131 — 



Grieve not for snow in thy tresses ; 
Mourn not thy pallor of brow; 
Greet each sign which frankly confesses 
The joys that have fled ; do not vow 
That Fate e'en now, 
hi her bounty doth allow 
Plenteous meed of favors royal, 
Making earth elysium, the kiss. 
And the golden house of bliss, 
And youth's large vision, lovely, loyal ; 
No more the languid eye discerneth 
The joys we miss 
Of early bliss; 
Youth ne'er returneth. 



Boast not the moon's rounded splendor; 
Fruit repays not the fall of the leaf; 
The thin crescent for me, and the tender, 
Green spring, all unconscious of grief ; 
Alas, too brief! 

Seek in song, tired soul, relief ; 
Make lament for days departed. 
When our emerald slippered youth, 
Jocund, trustful, bright with truth. 
Came tripping blithe and single-hearted 
Its torch reversed no longer burneth ; 
When frolic youth 
Hath gone, in sooth 
He ne'er returneth. 

— 132 — 



Read we aright the old story? 
The Earth-Queen, bewailing her child, 
Won Persephone back to the glory 
Of sunshine and zephyr, and mild 
Demeter smiled 

When wan Hades was beguiled, 
And the rescued girl upspringing 
From the arms of black-browed Dis, 
Happy in her great release, 
Advanced with heavenly music singing : 
"O rapturous soul, at last that learneth 
The Gods give peace ! 
By their release 
Bright youth returneth." 



Waste not then, in vain repining. 
Moments that so quickly flee ; 
Hesperus calls; yet is shining 
The sun that sinks toward the sea. 
Come, Phantasy! 
Help my saintly love and me, 
In the fabrics sunset buildeth, 
To see palaces as fair 
As the rosy dome of air 
That Eos for Tithonus gildeth. 
Restored, the soul its wage there earneth, 
With Gods to share 
The mansion fair 
Where youth returneth. 

— 133 — 



THE FRENCH MARKET. 



I 

Pedro Olivio, young, lithe and strong, 

Stands in the market with insolent air ; 

With elbows akimbo, scanning the throng, 

He tosses the curls of his raven-black hair. 

There's a smile on his lip, but the gleam in his eye 

Plays like the sheen of a Damascene blade, 

And the girls who just glance, as they come tripping by, 

Turn from the beauty which makes them afraid. 

Olive his cheek, but the blood of the grape 

Has flushed it a little and given a glow — 

Young Dionysus took on this shape — 

Means he now revelry, mischief or woe? 

Some say that Pedro is out of his sphere. 

Blue-blooded, gentle-born, cradled in pride, 

Cadiz his birthplace, his father the peer 

Of any hidalgo, who took for his bride 

The heiress of mines, but Lord knows what blood 

Mingled its currents, and poured in her veins ; 

Iberia and Carthage and Rome swelled the flood, 

Visigoth, Vandal and Moor; such is Spain's. 

How came it? Who knows? But the lad went adrift, 

With a cloud on his life, a pang in his heart, 

A pall on the past which man may not lift, 

— 134 — 



Despair and defiance as steeds at life's start. 
Such is the chariot race Pedro has run ; 
Little he's recked where his coursers have sped ; 
They have borne him exultant in heat of the sun 
Through the dust and the din from the past that is 

dead. 
Has he lacked for his bread, or light love, or strong 

wine? 
Not he to whom action and ardor is life ; 
The sea is his slave, he rules on the brine, 
He is ready for toil, or action, or strife. 
But why stands he now with that mock on his lip, 
So that, somehow, the vendors of this or of that. 
When they see him, find reason to quietly slip 
Round the edge of their stalls, and eagerly chat 
About nothings with neighbors, his eye to escape? 
Well they remember— 'tis two years ago — 
How with Carlos Hernandez he had that small scrape 
And gave him a sort of back-handed blow; 
It counted for nothing — but Carlos is dead. 
And now just a twelvemonth he quarreled again 
With Francois Lafitte, and a shot in the head 
By somebody put poor Francois out of pain. 
The roustabout Steve called him " Dago " one day; 
Steve was a negro as black as the soot; 
He was spoiled by his freedom, and had his horse 

play 
By kicking and stamping — a giant and a brute. 
This little Olivio caught up a stone, 
And hit him right square on his chimpanzee brow ; 

— 135 — 



So that stretched like Goliath Steve fell with a groan, 
And wanders round witless, a big beggar now. 
He beat slim Camille with the hilt of his knife, 
And choked her and kicked her ; the court could 

not act ; 
Little Camille would rather lose her own life 
Than hurt this Olivio by proving the fact. 
But why tell afresh the devil's own beads, 
This rosary black with guilt, shame and crime, 
Where each bead that is dropped rankles and bleeds 
— Let them sink to perdition, and rot in the slime. 

II 

But there now stands Pedro, waiting, it seems, 
For some one to come and cross his red path ; 
His brow has grown darker, as if evil dreams 
Were conjured from hell by the spell of his wrath. 
And hither comes stalking, sombre and stern, 
The sailor, Gil Sanchez, a fisherman now, 
Basque to the bone, with dark eyes that burn, 
A resolute jaw and a heavy square brow. 
Broad-shouldered, thin-flanked, he marches right on, 
And looks not to right or to left as he goes ; 
He carries his crest as high as a don — 
What matters the purse when the gold in it shows? 
Straight onward he comes ; but fronting him full, 
Pedro steps forward and says with a sneer, 
'* Blessed Virgin protect us ! Here's a Biscayan bull ; 
Run, good people, and hide ; you have reason for 
fear," 

— 136 — 



The sailor stopped short, his eye on his foe ; 
A moment he pondered, as gathering strength ; 
Then with words that came dropping, weighty and 

slow, 
He cast back the reproach, "So Pedro, at length, 
You pick out this place to answer the word 
Which clothed you with shame from your head to 

your feet 
When your loaded dice won. You never once stirred 
Last night, though you shivered, when 1 branded 

you cheat." 
" Thou liest, thou son of a she-wolf, thy den 
Was a cave in the rocks ; thy plundering mother"— 
But Gil Sanchez flings back, " It comes to this then ; 
Call Don Pedro a cheat, and he calls you — another. ' 
"You call me a cheat! You pirate! You thief! 
1 will have your heart's blood, if to meet me you dare." 
The Basque strode toward him, but a sigh of relief 
From the gathering crowd heaved out on the air, 
As Pedro leaped backward and broke through the ring, 
His glittering eye glancing and taking in all ; 
His enemy's menace, the crowd, everything. 
Till he saw what he wanted, a knife on a stall. 
Like lightning he sprang and seized the bright blade ; 
Then, with bounds like a panther, right onward he 

came 
At the man he had fled from. But Gil (not afraid. 
Though he saw that his life was the stake of the 

game), 
In turn wheeled and fled, some advantage to gain, 

— 137 — 



For he felt that the battle was badly begun. 

' Tis a race now for life ; down each narrow lane, 

Around booths, between stalls, how they pant as 

they run. 
But the tumult, the people, the women who shriek, 
The wringing of hands, the tears, the pale face 
Of Barbara, who bends o'er her babe, wan and meek, 
And prays Blessed Mary for safety and grace ! 
See the negroes, they chatter and roll their white eyes 
And huddle and scamper, their black skins turn grey ; 
Look at them, their feet keeping time as he flies 
With Pedro or Gil ; 'tis as good as a play. 
*' Ha ! talk of your bull-fights, but this is a time 
To feel every nerve as tense as the string 
On a bow," says Baltasar ; "perhaps 'tis a crime. 
But I feel like I saw that Basque bull in the ring. 
And the bull-fighter close at his heels with the sword 
To give him the stroke ; but beware of his horn. 
Thou bull-killing Pedro ! 1 have known a man gored 
By a bull of this breed ; thou must smite and not 

scorn." 
But the fleet-footed Pedro is gaining ; Gil sees. 
At the turn of a stall the grim shadow of death ; 
Yet his eye is alert as he rapidly flees. 
And he gathers his strength as hard comes his breath. 
There lies the great cleaver that Sigismund swings. 
When he hews up the beef which hangs o'er his block ; 
Sanchez pounces upon it, and, whirling, he flings 
Himself straight at his foe, who recoils from the shock. 
Too late, mad pursuer, on thy shoulder-blade falls 

— 138 — 



The axe, crushing down through brawn and through 

bone ; 
The red blood leaps, spurting o'er pavement and walls, 
And the fighter sinks down with a curse and a groan. 
His eyes swim in blackness, but his fingers still clutch 
At the hilt of his knife and then feebly relax ; 
And mangled and crumpled he dies in a hutch. 
Sanchez gives him one look, then throws down the axe. 
The people come gathering ; a roar and a rush. 
Some shrieks and a sob from Camille who bends 
O'er the dead ; " O my heart ! " then a hush. 
The policeman is here — the tragedy ends. 



— 139 — 



THE SKYLARK. 



I rise, aspiring bird, witli thee, 

On pinion light, to soar, and see 

The mysteries of the upper air; 

My spirit poises on its wing. 

And learns with thee to praise and sing 

Fullness of beauty everywhere. 

On fleecy chariots of the cloud 

We float, drawn by our coursers proud. 

The air steeds from the west wind's stalls 

Ocean and land far down grow dim. 

While through the azure depths we swim, 

Voice answering voice with echoing calls. 

Up through the flood of ruddy light. 

We heavenward cleave our double flight. 

Till on the thin air's outer bound 

We pause, and o'er the abysmal verge 

Pour volumed forth a choral surge, 

That faints in circling waves of sound. 



140 



EVOLUTION AND CREATION. 



1 

Before the Kosmos, Chaos ruled without law or de- 

No fiat brought forth order or caused the light to 

shine ; 
At first, man was potential, and then was protoplasm, 
Though science does not tell us how to bridge the 

awful chasm ; 
But predicate a Monad, and without the aid of fiction, 
Should another glide across it, life would be evolved 

by friction. 
Thence with life there came a cell, and the cell be- 
came a growth, 
And the growth became a Something, and another 

Something ; both, 
In the course of generations too long to note by time. 
Grew at last to be a polywog, with an increment of 

lime. 
So it got an osseous structure and wriggled with its 

tail, 
Till it stretched into a saurian — a weasel — or a whale ; 
Though it may have been an ostrich, or it may have 

been an ape. 
But it still kept developing— from this is no escape ; 

— 111 — 



And thus in many epochs it got itself a thumb, 
Until at last it was a man, but pithecoid and dumb, 
Then certain roiling molecules and maggots of the 

brain 
Gave rise to speech and intellect — nothing can be 

more plain. 
Reason begat utility, equivalent, you know, 
To love and virtue, hope and God — most evidently so. 
And thus through age and epoch and son piled on age 
At last we reach a Huxley and learn to make a Sage ; 
And so the world goes round and round, as Old 

Aunt Rhody said, 
And ancient Chaos' eldest son. King Chance, reigns 

in his stead. 

II 

In the beginning was the Word ; 
It breathed its fiat, Chaos stirred ; 
Obedient to the First Great Cause, 
It moved according to His laws, 
And order reigned, design prevailed, 
Nature was born, and life unveiled. 
Whether our minds can grasp this plan, 
Or trace the origin of man, 
Why agonizing reel in doubt? 
Why gibe and jeer and mock and flout 
At those self-centred truths which stand 
Like beacons on a desert strand ? 
On each soul's consciousness they rest, 
Self-evidential, and impressed 

— 142 — 



With that sharp signet, on whose face, 

Deep-graved, " Necessity," we trace. 

We know that like a prisoner pale, 

Who from the windows of his jail 

Can catch but glimpses of that world 

Whose constellations are unfurled 

To happier eyes which freely gaze 

On all the stars in midnight's maze, 

The spirit fettered here to earth 

By flesh and time and space, the worth 

Of realms beyond its ken can guess 

Only in purblind feebleness ; 

But still its ample pinions feel 

The power to rise and soar and wheel 

And revel where the bow is bent 

Which spans with hope the firmament. 

Why seek our Maker in the dust. 

Rather than rest in solemn trust 

On that great arm able to clasp 

The universe within its grasp. 

And hold the balance firm and sure 

While time and space and worlds endure? 

What does it matter whether man 

Six thousand years ago began. 

Or through a myriad centuries grew, 

Becoming wiser and more true? 

Go, boasting skeptic, forge the links 

'Twixt dust and that which knows it thinks ; 

Teach science to span the abyss that gapes 

' Twixt man and all the race of apes ; 

— 143 — 



Tell why this self-sufficing force, 

Which once gave life in nature's course, 

No more informs the insensate clod, 

And blindly does the work of God ; 

Else cease thy clamorous, strident claim 

That science walks thus blind and lame, 

Making hypothesis the base 

For all the history of our race. 

Through nature's realm law reigns supreme 

Its Giver is no dotard's dream ; 

The universe, built with design, 

Is proof of power and will divine ; 

And in creation, be the cause 

His first or secondary laws, 

By countless links this endless chain 

Leads back at last to God again. 



144 



THE EPITAPH. 



Friend Phil, to me convivially, 
Declared he 'd write my epitaph ; 
And thus he spake with tankard high, 
With merriment in lip and eye. 
And quip and jest and ringing laugh. 

" Here lies friend Will ; his voice is still 
But ahl he was good company." 
Those were his words; but many a day 
Since then hath fled and passed away — 
And such a friend I ne'er shall see. 

Low lies his head in narrow bed. 
No more we'll hear his joyous laugh ; 
Now I am such poor company, 
No one would think it fitted me ; 
So, Phil, be this tliv epitaph. 



145 — 



THE SEALED BOOK. 

A RIDDLE. 



No royal road to learning leads, 

Great thoughts are born, like golden deeds. 

From large attempts and strenuous needs ; 

And thus, in every clime and age. 

The aim of scholar, saint and sage 

Centres upon the inspiring page. 

Where wit and wisdom, worth and sense. 

And charity, void of offence. 

Combine toward perfect excellence. 



146 



TO GERTRUDE. 



Little lady! Thee I bless, 
With a patriarch's tenderness ! 
May thy dreams be dreams of truth ; 
May thy deeds be deeds of ruth ; 
May thy hours on golden wing 
Bring thee gifts good angels bring ; 
And may thy spirit dwell in light, 
Where all is pure and fair and bright. 



— 147 — 



A BENEDICTION. 



Child of my choicest friend, who next my heart 
Since youth's bright prime I've worn, nor found him 

less 
In loyalty and love than honor's core! 
Fair babe, thou tender bud upon a stem 
Of fine ancestral stock, whose honest worth 
Hath good report of all men in the past! 
With promise of new honors to the old 
1 greet thee ! This my welcome : may the dew 
Of thy young life exhale to heaven in prayer. 
And may thy morn be always summer bright 
With smiles from God's good angels standing near ! 
The heritage of joy and beauty thine, 
Such as thy mother hath ; thy father's force, 
Pliant and masterful as ashen wand 
When wielded in the archer's sinewy grasp ! 
May thy good mother's care mould all thy days 
To virtue by her gentle sway and love ; 
And may thy noon blaze like thy noble sire's, 
Who, conse,crated in the cause of truth, 
Did strenuous services on the tented field 
And later brought his laurels to the board 
Where wisdom counsels for the good of state. 
Thine be his eloquence, his sense, his truth, 
His fine intelligence, his prudent thought; 
Thine be his manly symmetry of soul. 
His courage, gentleness and lofty grace; 



And when thy westering day draws near its close, 
God grant thee ail things good, grace, wealth and 

power, 
Wisdom and strength and venerated age; 
And may God keep thee with thy heart still young, 
Grateful and trusting, constant, tender, true. 
Thy naming brought a blessing, thy name be blessed. 
It soothed a heart sore struggling in the depths, 
And braced a spirit which the storms of fate 
Were beating wildly. Thou 'rt the gentle star, 
Whose sweet, auspicious influence shall guide 
The wearied voyager to a haven of rest — 
Of rest and hope,— since thou the token art 
How firm the base of ancient friendship stands. 
The omen shall not fail, but, rising still. 
High in the ascendant it shall lustrous shine 
With benefaction and with good to man ; 
Its radiance mild, here kindled, far shall beam 
Upon thy race and all things great and small. 
Like a green olive tree, with steadfast trust 
In God's great mercy, may'st thou flourish wide. 
Deep-rooted, long enduring, peaceful, strong, 
Shedding abundance on a grateful land. 
May all the clouds that seem to frown above 
Be to thee but the shadow of God's wings. 
And all the sunshine but his smiles of love; 
And may thy children and their children come 
To do thee reverence in the days beyond. 
This be the blessing of a heart outworn 
To one fresh springing to the joys of life, 
3enedicite ! 

^149 — 



THE LIVE OAK. 



O stately tree! proud, dark and lone, 

Read me the runes that thou hast known, 

In the long ages thou hast grown 

On this low mound, whose shelly core 

Was built beside the Gulf's low shore 

By tribes whose forms are seen no more. 

Thy branches stretch their arms on high. 

The forked lightnings to defy 

And the fierce blasts that hurtle by; 

Thy lustrous foliage ever green. 

Rich as the mantle of a queen, 

Gladdens the solitary scene ; 

Or weeds of moss thy limbs array, 

Like an old friar clad in gray, 

Whose cowled head is bowed to pray. 

Reveal, O oracle ! the spell 

Dodona's priestess knew so well, 

When, shrouded in her sylvan cell. 

She heard the voice that ne'er deceives 

In the low murmur of thy leaves 

And the weird melody it weaves ; 

Or, if for us the magic chime 

That rings the future's matin prime 

Is silent of the coming time, 



Tell me, old oak ! tales of the past, 
Thy struggles with the tempest's blast, 
And all the hoard of lore thou hast. 
Tell me how, on this verdant sod. 
The Indian, who as master trod. 
In the sun's glory worshipped God ; 
And, gathering in from bay and creek, 
Each band led by a plumed cacique. 
Came in its boat of carven beak 
Here to hold council, and debate 
The weal of their primeval state, 
And all their deeds of war narrate. 
Tell how the Spaniard fixed the Cross 
Beneath the shadows of thy moss. 
And years began of strife and loss ; 
Till, vanished both, the Saxon's tread 
Threads aisles as solemn as e'er led 
Where dim cathedral arched o'erhead — 
That stalwart race, whose onward stride 
Takes no step backward, and whose tide 
Force cannot stay, nor power abide. 
Prince of the forest ! king of trees ! 
Breasting the battle and the breeze, 
I see thee ride the stormy seas ; 
Reborn as a stately ship again, 
Sailing far o'er the Southern Main, 
Lord of the billows thou shalt reign. 
But whatsoe'er thy fate shall be, 
' Tis fixed by Heaven's high decree. 
As death, or lofty destiny. 

— 151- 



Living, or dead, tliou still slialt stand, 

Robust and sound, unshaken, grand, 

A symbol of our Southern land. 

Nor scorching ray, nor mantle spread 

By winter's hand above thy head, 

Shall bring thee blight, or wake thy dread, 

Shall mar the beauty and the sheen 

That dwell forever in the green, 

The emerald of thy leafy screen. 

Thy fibre tough and ribs like rock 

Shall meet and fend the battle's shock 

And the tornado's rage shall mock. 

When on thy heart smite blade and sledge, 

' Twill blunt the axe and turn the edge. 

And crush the hand that wields the wedge ; 

And, hewed by whatsoe'er command. 

Will long survive the shaping hand. 

Proud symbol of our Southern land. 



— 152- 



VIII 
PANSIES, VIOLETS AND ASPHODELS, 



"There is pansies, that's for thoughts," 

*' The pansies streaked with jet, 
The glowing violet." 

— Lycidas, 

"Violets dim, 
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes 
Or Cytherea's breath." 

"All these true notes of immortality 

In our heart's tables we shall written find." 

— Sir J. Davies. 

" Adversity, life's thistle, thou 'rt a triple crown ; 
First sting, then flower, and last the buoyant down." 
— t/ldapted from John Foster. 

"For who knoweth what is good for man in this 
life, all the days of his life which he spendeth as a 
shadow." — Ecclesiastes vi. 12. 



-15^ 



REFLECTION, 



Reflection, sombre muse, who turns our eyes 

From this vain world and transient things of naught. 

To that pure essence which transcends the skies, 

And dwells immortal in unclouded thought! 

Grant to the man whose soul for truth has sought, 

Who patient delves for wisdom's utmost root 

in lowest depths and mysteries of the mind, 

To shred the tree of knowledge of its fruit, 

And thus, perchance stripped of its bitter rind. 

To taste its meat and e'en its core to find. 

O nurse of Conscience! We, who seek the true, 

Ask for thine aid to read the palimpsest, 

Whereon is written in vulgar script the new. 

Hiding in hieroglyph whate'er is best, 

And leaving still its riddles to be guessed. 



— J34- 



THE LEGEND OF JUBAL." 

(to GEORGE ELLIOT.) 



A voice comes sounding o'er the mighty main, 
How Jubal's lyre wol<e music's earliest strain, 
And poesy was born in human pain ; 
How the great soul that gave the idea birth, 
Spurned and derided sank to mother earth, 
All men forgetting one man's priceless worth. 
But though in dust he sought his kindred clod, 
Through airy realms his conquering idea trod, 
And grew, and, mounting, triumphed as a god. 
Thus out of death sprang life, and the blank doom 
Of one awoke the many, and the tomb 
Touched by the spirit was the teeming womb 
Whence stirred to being that divine unrest 
Which quickened once still strives toward the Best, 
And will not down at any power's behest ; 
Sweet discontent, that feels a secret pain 
In what it doth, and what doth not, attain, 
And counts all gain as loss, all loss as gain. 



— 155 



WHITED SEPULCHRES. 



Where dwells the soul so pure and bold as dare 
Its central secrets to the world lay bare, 
Its faults and follies, its frailties and woes 
To the cold stare of callous man disclose, 
Or e'en to the scrutiny of one kind eye 
Reveal its labyrinthine mystery? 

Choose ye from those of loftiest mould and mind, 
Highest in heart, an honor to mankind, 
Some name that like a pyramid doth stand 
Broad on its base, severe, compact and grand ; 
its apex challenges the eternal sky, 
Its outlines sharp time's waste and storms defy ; 
Go, thread its vaulted cells; do marble walls, 
Crusted with gems, enclose enchanted halls. 
Where art supreme hath blended the sublime 
With things most beautiful? Ah, no! the slime 
Of ages vents its foul and festering breath 
And stains a crypt — its only tenant, death. 
A prophet speaks ; thousands his word obey ; 
His voice is law; he tears the veil away; 
Mokanna's face, visage of fiendish ghoul. 
Dismays each breast; the godlike now is foul; 
And yet 'tis but the lifting of the veil 
That chills the heart and makes the cheek grow pale. 

-- 156 -^ 



Mokanna dwells in every bosom's core, 

Shrouded from those who kneel, and, blind, adore. 

O Pentecostal flame, pure truth, true light. 
Purge and illume the sepulchre's black night! 
O blood of Christ, which washeth every sin. 
Heal the marred visage, cleanse the soul within ! 



— 157 — 



THE WASP, 



I dreamed that I was young and strong, 

Rich, happy, wise and great, 

And that I had the gift of song 

To gladden such estate; 

Yet all was marred — I see you smile — 

For poised on angry wing, 

A wasp menaced me all the while ; 

I could not crush the thing. 

It vexed my hours of ease ; the feast 

in vain its bounties spread ; 

Thought faltered, for its watch ne'er ceased, 

While buzzed the wasp o'er head. 

1 woke at last ; 'twas but a dream ; 

Yet still my wakened sight 

Welcomed the morning's blessed beam 

That put the wasp to flight. 

So, though our realm, rich in all bliss. 

Should bar each sorrow out, 

Yet still, in dreams, e'en into this 

Must buzz the demon Doubt, 

Which, threatening with its poisoned sting, 

No power can chase away, 

Till Heaven's own light, on seraph wing. 

Lets in the perfect day. 



THE BUTTERFLY. 

IMITATION OF THE GERMAN OF VV. HEY. 



Ho ! little thing 

On golden wing, 

Flitting, flaunting butterfly! 

Why do you play 

The livelong day 

Underneath the summer sky? 

Ah ! little boy. 

We both enjoy 

Bloom-sweets, sunshine, summer-sky ; 

But the dawn's red 

May find me dead,— 

For boys and butterflies must die. 



— 159- 



GUI BONO. 



" Arise, put on thy strength ; dreamer, behold, 
The world awaits thy coming and thy worth ; 
It offers all to him, both wise and bold. 
Who dare dominion claim on this weak earth ! " 

Now, wherefore, shouldst thou seek to stir this breast 
With vaulting thoughts and aspirations high? 
Leave to its solitude the soul at rest. 
Ruffled by naught save some half-struggling sigh. 

Think'st thou that passion's cyclones have not swept 
Its placid waters into lashing waves? 
Those blasts still breathe, but by my will are kept 
Shackled within the spirit's secret caves. 

Since I have gained the power to govern these, 
Which now I hold controlled with steady hand. 
Would it be wise to give the winds release 
And trust the storm to hearken my command? 

Tempests are grand fiom where the tall cliffs frown. 
Sheltering the watcher on the rockbound shore ; 
But he who sails and sees his ship go down 
Loses the hope that sinks to rise no more. 

— 160 — 



The sportive surf comes leaping to the land, 
Its silver crest with sparkling diamonds decked, 
Its murmurs music ; on the tawny strand 
Search for the drift, the relics of the wrecked. 

"Arise! put on thy strength!" — 'Tis mockery; 
Not all the outer world is worth the strife. 
To guard the soul and keep it strong and free 
Fill up the narrow measure of a life. 



— 161 



CARPE DIEM. 



Behold at dawn the opening flower 
Unfold its beauties to the light, 
And bring to the auspicious hour 
The dew and fragrance of the night. 

When noon's meridian splendors blaze, 
What full blown glories greet the sun, 
Where glow the aster's rival rays, 
Nor seek its eager gaze to shun. 

But parching heat, or killing frost. 
Strikes to the heart the vaunting bloom ; 
Its splendors fade, its sweets are lost; 
It meets the universal doom. 

And so decay all earthly things, 
The beauty, pride and joy of man; 
What glamour hope around them flings 
Will fade away with youth's brief span. 

Catch, then, the fragrance while you may, 
Breathe joy while yet its perfumes last; 
And seize each fitting bliss to-day, 
That with to-morrow joins the past. 

Nor mourn because perennial spring. 
To thee, by fate, is still denied ; 
What harvest autumn frosts may bring 
Accept, with what may else betide. 

— 162- 



REST. 

Here let me rest among these grand old mountains, 
Whence flowed the parent stream that filled these 

veins ; 
The rivulet returns unto the fountains, 
Weary of wandering in the wide spread plains. 

Weary of life and of its endless striving ; 
Weary of the world's unloving, hot embrace; 
Weary of wild and aimless chariot-driving, 
Where Phaethon, not Phoebus, guides the race. 

Here let us rest with the blue vault above us. 
Where yon grey mountain rears Its cloud-capped head; 
Here may we fancy that the angels love us, 
And Hope, long buried, may rise from the dead. 

Here let us pause and drink fresh inspiration 
From living wells that pierce the upper air ; 
Is't a humor of the imagination. 
Or do its draughts bring surcease to our care? 

Is there a healing in these stirring breezes, 
That soothes the anguish of a life undone; 
Or must we toil till the heart's beating ceases, 
And all this unrequited race is run? 

But why now vex the soul with troubling questions, 
For answers from an oracle long dumb? 
Let us consent to Nature's kind suggestions. 
Content with respite till the solace come. 

— 163 — 



LETHE. 



Come, old friend, 

Drink to oblivion ; 

For all things end 

Like Merlin and Vivien ; 

Wisdom list'netli to the world's illusion, 

And the end thereof is death and confusion. 

Canst thou stay 

The winged present?. 

It hastes away 

With step incessant ; 

Raindrops sink in an infinite ocean, 

And thoughts of man are but modes of motion. 

Wealth, power, fame, 

Time's razing fmger 

Blights like flame ; 

But yet they linger 

In the chatter of the human magpie, 

The fainting yodel of the Alpine cragcry. 

Canst forget 

Love's sweet dominion? 

Not yet, not yet ! 

But Lethe's pinion 

Will sweep like night o'er its fair creations. 

And bury in blackness the light of nations. 

— 164 — 



LOTUS LAND. 



Upon the strand of Lotus Land 

My slender shallop went ashore; 

There was it cast with shivered mast 

And riven sail and broken oar, 

To leave that pleasant land no more, 
To quit that fateful land no more. 

Its scented air, its blossoms rare, 

Invited to a sweet repose; 

Nepenthe pale, with filmy veil, 

Out of the silvery waters rose, 

The volume of the past to close. 
With drowsy hand its clasps to close. 

With mild surprise, our dreamy eyes 
See visions lingering as they pass, 
That may not stay, but glide away 
And vanish from the sight, alas ! 

Like shadows mirrored in a glass, 
Like shadows in a magic glass. 

Now joy is dead and hope hath tied. 
But sorrow folds her sable wing; 
Serene we wait the voice of fate, 
And what these halcyon days may bring, 
While listening to the Sirens sing. 
The songs the cruel Sirens sing. 

— Ib5 — 



KOSMOS. 



THE DREAM OF THE TIME-SPIRIT. 



From the centre of Being out to the verge, 
Whence its circles again begin and pervade, 
The billows of Thought through the Universe surge 
And the Whole through omnipotent Reason is made. 
From the Great White Throne pours a crystalline sea, 
A limitless ocean with never a shore, 
And its unceasing tides flow eternally, 
And will roll and roll on forevermore. 



The foam tipped crests of its waves break in spray 
— The infinite forms of the Infinite Thought — 
But the spindrift and sea pulse a law obey 
That governs their going, by which they are wrought 
Into semblance of substance that mirrors the One — 
Name it nature, or matter, the frame of things. 
The universe, kosmos — yet planet and sun 
And stars are but spume that the thought wave 
flings. 

— 1B6- 



From the splendid sun-stars that blaze in the belt 
Of Orion, inarching the realms of the night, 
To the snow flakes that sparkle a moment and melt 
And the dew-drop that glistens in morn's early light 
— What are they but moods of the Being that Is, 
The forms that His Thought in its process may take? 
Constellations and atoms are equally His, 
Creation's the mould that His ideas make. 



The effluence of Spirit — of the Substantive Whole — 
Omnipotent Will — is the ultimate force, 
And, embodied in man, manifest in his soul, 
It images forth its creative source. 
When the self-conscious Unity limits His Thought 
By the measure of number, of time and of space, 
In the spirit of man this marvel is wrought. 
That it mirrors in little the Infinite face. 



The vast ocean current, with mysterious drift. 
Sweeps onward and onward from tropic to pole. 
But with whirlpool and bend its tides veer and shift 
And backward the seaweed sometimes seems to roll ; 
So the small human eye, purblind, only sees 
The refluent ripple in God's great Gulf stream, 
But its flood tide bears on, under Heaven's decrees. 
The eddies of evil that mar the World-Dream. 



loT- 



THE THANE'S SAYING. 



Paulinus the missionary urged King- Edwin to cast down 
his idols and worship Christ. Then the King's chief councillor 
spake thus: 

Out of the stress and the strain 

Of a stormy night, 
Out of the cold and the rain 

Into thejight 
Of Earth's Walhalla, 
Cometh the swallow 
— O dreary flight ! 
The blast through the opened casement flings 
The little bird with its weary wings. 

Out of the darkness he came 

To this banquet hall, 
Where the torches all aflame 

Flare on the wall ; 
And ribald laughter 
Shaketh the rafter. 
And jest and brawl 
And the wine cup and wassail wax high — 
Whither away shall the small bird fly? 

— 168 — 



Dazed by the glow and the glare, 

And the stifling smoke 
Of torch and cresset that flare, 

And smouldering oak, 
Wildly he flieth, 
Faintly he crieth, 
Till all the folk 
Look to behold what the end shall be 
Of this piteous birdling's tragedy. 



But out through a window wide 

Of the noisy room, 
The tired pinions swiftly glide 

Into the gloom ; 
So no man knoweth, 
Whither he goeth. 
Beyond the tomb. 
Here the soul fluttereth, its past forgot, 
And whither it soareth, it seeth not. 



— 169 



WELCOME, DEAR GRIEF! 



Welcome, dear Grief! thy footstep on the stair, 
And thy familiar hand upon my door. 
Thy sigh soft heaved upon the midnight air. 
Thy dark robe's trail upon my chamber floor, 
Are welcome evermore. 

For how can joy, present or yet to come, 

Of solace to me grant such ample store, 

As wakeful memory, which, though cowled and dumb, 

Yet mirrors to my gaze the days of yore, 

Made welcome evermore. 

Vain pleasure, with thy mimicry of youth. 
Thou hast no power my dead hopes to restore; 
Nay rather memory and sad eyed truth, 
With thee, dear Grief, recalling love's lost lore, 
Be welcome evermore. 



ITO' 



PRAYER ANSWERED. 



The sun from heaven that beameth 

O'er land and sea, 

And with its splendor streameth 

O'er lake and lea, 

Still lifteth up with every ray 

The mists that on their bosom lay. 

And God's great love, which poureth 

On hearts of men 

The ben i son that ensureth 

Return again. 

Still draweth by power divine on higk 

Oar human woes in prayer and sigh. 

But rising vapor hideth 

With clouds the sun, 

While the rude storm king rideth, 

His race to run ; 

So prayer and sigh seem oft to rise 

In frowning clouds and angry skies. 

But as the rain descendeth 

On blade and flower. 

And as the rainbow bendeth 

At sunset hour, 

So God's great grace shall answer prayer, 

Love bless the earth, hope paint the air. 

— 171- 



REJOICE. 



Rejoice, a child is born ! 

The herald of the sky 
Proclaims a joyous morn, 

A glorious destiny. 
An incense breathing air 

His swelling breast shall fill ; 
And music everywhere, 

From bird and leaf and rill. 
And, tenderer than them all, 

A mother's voice shall soothe 
And answer to his call ; 

And gentle hands shall smooth 
The pillow of the child ; 

So that great Nature's voice, 
Earth-mother calm and mild. 

Calls out, "rejoice, rejoice!" 

Rejoice! The budding form 

Hath blossomed now at length 

Into a man, whose warm 

Blood adds strength unto strength, 

— 172 — 



Action in every nerve, 

Fibre and tliew and limb, 
Able to strive or serve, 

To hew, to hunt, to hymn 
With clarion notes the praise 

Of the dear Lord who gives 
To man such joyous days 

In all the days he lives; 
So that such goodly power 

Gives every heart a voice 
To praise creation's flower, 



Rejoice! the ripened fruit 

Hangs on the bending bough ; 
And sweeter than the lute 

Are wisdom's words ; while brow 
Of venerable age 

And heart of tender ruth 
Mark the beloved sage, 

The friend of right and truth. 
His to rehearse the lore 

Of all the good and wise, 
Dispense their hoarded store. 

And give light to the eyes 
Of those who darkly grope, 

And to the dumb give voice, 
And to the fainting, hope, 

And bid himself, "rejoice!" 

— 173 — 



Rejoice ! The Lord draws near 

And in his arms bears sheaves. 
Ah ! friend ! Be of good cheer, 

When from the autumn leaves 
He plucks the mellow fruit 

And lays it on his breast. 
The honeyed tongue is mute, 

The eager brain at rest; 
The work of life is done, 

The harvest must be stored; 
The harbor has been won; 

The bark must now be moored 
But through the gathering gloom, 

Hark to the angel voice, 
Which whispers from the tomb, 

" Rejoice, O soul, rejoice ! " 



174- 



THE FEAR OF DEATH. 



What is this fear of death ? 

Is it the dying, 
The gasp of the last, struggling breath, 
When life is flying? 
The fading memory of this world of sorrow, 
The dark foreboding of a fearful morrow? 

Is it the beaded brow, 

The eye that glazes. 
The once strong arm, so feeble now; 
The unknown mazes 
Of those dread chambers, from whose lowering portals 
Return no more retreating feet of mortals ? 



Is it, that — all forgot, 

No loved one keeping 
Sad, tender watch above the spot 
Where we lie sleeping — 
We shrink to think upon the earthy pillow, 
The votive urn, the sod, the pendant willow? 

— 175 — 



strive to forget the grief 

O'er death that lingers; 
The choking sobs, the farewells brief, 
The picking fingers 
That seem to weave, in some sad, vacant manner, 
A blazon for death's overhanging banner. 



Forget them, feeble Man ! 

But oh, remember! 
That, leaping from our narrow span, 
The fading ember 
Flashes from ashes toward a bliss supernal, 
In spaces infinite and realms eternal. 



— 176- 



EUTHANASIA 



THREE VOICES. 



MILES. 

How would I die? As falls the oak 
When riven by the lightning's stroke, 
Amid the storm, the stress, the strain 
Of battling clouds and driving rain ; 
When all the mighty winds that blow 
Come sweeping on like that Arch-foe 
Who led his legions to the assault 
Up the long steeps of Heaven's blue vault. 
Not to the touch of slow decay 
My heart of oak should wear away, 
With bark and bough and haughty crest 
Mouldering to dust — the rust called rest. 
For me the tempest and the strife ; 
Rather one hour of actual life 
Than wear out cycles in a dream, 
Where earthly shadows glide and scheme 
And weary heaven with muttered spells, 
Then sink into their sodded cells. 
The old Greek gave the brave heart voice, 
In fleet Pelides' noble choice. 

— 177 — 



My requiem be the thunder crash 
That follows on the fatal flash, 
Whether of heaven's unerring blow, 
Or the fell stroke of human foe. 



CLERICUS. 

O not for me the sudden blow 
That lays the forest monarch low ! 
Rather midst friends, whose keen distress 
Shall share my gloom and make it less; 
With kindly hands to soothe my pain, 
And friendship's sadly decorous train 
To lead me down to that dark shore 
Which all must leave and touch no more 
I'd tread the flinty path, and lean 
On pity's arm, with thought serene, 
Buoyed by philosophy's wise speech 
And truths religion bends to teach. 



MILES. 

That Norseman old, whose fiery blood 
Peril and pain of field and flood 
Had left untamed, saw dim the truth 
That fate and nature feel no ruth 

— 178 — 



For man, their youngest, tenderest child. 

Born in the purple, yet defiled. 

When stark death came, he raised his hand ; 

''Give me," he cried, "my battle brand; 

Set me astride my war-horse bold ; 

I'll meet this foe, as erst of old 

I've met all foes; I'll meet death now 

In arms opposed with fearless brow." 

Aye, best of all, in battle's brunt, 

To fall with mortal wound in front. 

When serried legions hesitate 

To rush right on at war's red gate, 

But touched at last with noble shame 

By some heroic voice, like flame 

Sweep o'er the field, till, clasped in death, 

Sink friend and foe, 'neath battle's breath ; 

Then would I fall, midst steel and fire. 

With victory for my funeral pyre. 



CLERICUS. 

Better like Socrates, in awe. 

But not in fear, fulfil the law 

And bow to Athens' unjust decree. 

Finding in death a victory 

For truth o'er all the brood of wrong, 

And live in story and in song. 

Or, if oblivion, with its train 

— 179 — 



Of fading shadows, needs must reign 
O'er thee and thine, breathe on the air 
To him who heareth, heedeth prayer, 
One sigh to take thee to His breast, 
The infinite, eternal rest; 
Then turn with steady step away 
From darl<ness to the realms of dav. 



SAPIENS. 

What matters how death comes or when ; 

It comes to all the sons of men. 

What is for all must needs be wise, 

Must needs be good, if human eyes 

The scope could see*of that full plan 

Made by divinity for man. 

The soul prepared stands like a rock 

'Gainst battle's stroke or tempest shock ; 

The scaffold and the hemlock bowl 

Shake not its lofty self-control, 

Nor superstition's gloomy fears. 

Dinning death's terrors in its ears. 

It knows that He who gave us breath 

Gives a like blessing in our death ; 

That the same care which shields our prime 

On this low-lying shoal of time, 

Which stretches out on either side 

Washed by eternity's dark tide, 

— 180 — 



Will guide us on that unknown shore 
The faltering tongue names "Evermore,' 
And guard the full grown spirit's path 
With love and joy, not woe and wrath. 
Be sure that justice reigns and truth ; 
Hope leans secure on heavenly ruth. 



381 



Fade, flowers, fade ; nature will have it so ; 
Tis but what we must in our autumn do." 

—IVallei. 



THE END. 



— J82 — 



NOTES 



Note A.— These verses were written New Year's Day, 
1854, 3.nd give the literal facts as related to the author at the 
time. In 1S73, Rev. J. J. Lafferty, of Texas, travelling in 
Texas, wrote home the following account of a similar incident, 
related to him as occurring in 1868. Whether it was a coinci- 
dence, or the evolution of a myth, I cannot say. 

" I travelled with a citizen of upper or northern Texas, 
who gave me an account of the murder of a family in Wise 
county by the savages, and the heroic fight made by the little 
boys and their mother before they fell victims to their brutal 
foe. On the loth day of August, 186S, the Indians came in 
sight, and the family of four children and their mother ran 
into the log cabin and barred the doors. The building had 
loopholes. The eldest boy— about twelve — toe k position at one 
of the notches in the logs. The next boy loaded the empty 
rifle while his brother was using the other. The mother began 
moulding bullets, and the two other children — little girls, al- 
most babies — carried the fresh balls across the room to the 
brave boys. The young rifleman never wasted a shot. His aim 
was so true and the fire so rapid that the savages imagined 
there were several rangers in the house. After losing three or 
lour warriors, they got behind the wood pilej m the yard. At 
every crack of the rifle an Indian fell among the logs. He 
killed seven. An eye-witness of the pools of blood in the 
yard said the ground 'looked like two beeves had been butch- 
ered there.' The Indians were watching a chance to run, when 
a half-breed who understood English overheard the mother 
say * the lead is all out.' They made an assault upon the door, 
broke it down and slew the heroic family. My informant, who 
had visited the scene, said the print of a child's foot, wet with 
blood — its mother's blood — still remained on the floor. No one 
had ever occupied the house since this horrible tragedy. The 
men about the United States forts had heard the Indians speak 
of the deadly fire oi the boy, and the half-breed related the 
story to the traders with the Federal Army on the frontier." 

Note C. — This version has been changed in some 
respects from its form as originally printed. 

— 183 — 



719 



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